Indian stock market rose today and indices closed higher as lower crude oil prices and the US Federal Reserve keeping interest rates unchanged eased fears of a rise in inflation. After opening 129 points higher at the start of the session, it made an intraday high of 74,812 and low of 74,360. In this way, a total fluctuation of 452 points was seen throughout the day and at the end of the day the Sensex increased by 128 points or 0.17 percent and closed at 74,611. After opening 37 points lower, Nifty crossed 22,700 during the day to hit a high of 22,710 and ended the day at 22,648, up 43 points or 0.19 per cent.
US Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said late on Wednesday that an increase in interest rates is unlikely, but a cut in interest rates will be considered only if inflation decreases. There is concern that interest rates will be raised following higher than expected inflation in the US and expectations that interest rates will fall as economic growth slows. However, after this statement of the Chairman, it was indicated that for the time being the interest rate will remain the same. Therefore a rise was seen in the market. Among Sensex stocks, HDFC Bank, Power Grid, Asian Paints, TCS and Tata Motors were the top gainers, while the top losers were ICICI Bank, Kotak Bank, Bharti Airtel and Axis Bank. HDFC Bank alone contributed 109 points to the total increase of 128 points in Sensex.
Indian IT stocks, which are sensitive to the US, were seen flat today with the Nifty IT index closing flat on top. The performance of IT stocks is being adversely affected as IT spending is being reduced by various companies due to high interest rates in the US currently. Meanwhile, global crude oil prices also fell to a seven-week low yesterday, easing inflation concerns in India.
Both Nifty Metal and Auto indices closed with a gain of 1.3 per cent today. Power and Metal indices also rose by one per cent, while Nifty Oil and Gas index closed 0.8 per cent higher today. Hindustan Petroleum and Bharat Petroleum gained 8 per cent and 4.6 per cent, respectively, amid signs that lower crude prices would ease margin pressure, leading the oil index to close higher. However, bank and realty indices closed with losses. For the broader market, mid-cap and small-cap stocks continued to outperform, with the BSE mid-cap index closing 0.9 per cent up and the small-cap index closing 0.29 per cent up. Kotak Mahindra Bank today announced the resignation of its Joint Managing Director KVS Manian, leading to a 2.83 per cent fall in the bank's shares. Due to the inclusion of these shares in the Sensex, the rise in the Sensex was limited. Today FIIA in Indian stock market is Rs. 964 crore net sales, while DII reported Rs. Took a net of Rs 1,352 crore. Today the combined market capitalization of companies listed on BSE is Rs. Increase to Rs 1.98 lakh crore. 408.53 lakh crore. The market situation was overall negative, with 1,926 shares declining, 1,912 shares rising, while 119 shares closed flat.