Stock markets open positive: Sensex crosses 60,000, Nifty past 17,900-mark

The stock markets opened on a firm footing on first day of trading in new week. At 09:16 AM, the Sensex was up 402.36 points or 0.67 percent at 60,147.01. Nifty was up 112 points or 0.63 percent at 17,924.70. About 1894 shares have advanced, 396 shares declined, and 182 shares are unchanged.

Among major gainers on the bourses were TCS, ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank, Axis Bank and Maruti Suzuki. Among early losers were Wipro, Cipla, Nestle, Sun Pharma and HCL Technologies.

Nifty opened gap-up on January 7 and rose till 10:45 hours. At close, Nifty was up 0.38 percent or 66.8 points at 17,812.7.

Nifty logged the best week in 4 months rising 2.6 percent. On daily charts, the Nifty however has formed a long legged doji with slightly upward bias. Volume pickup and positive advance decline ratio portend well for the near term. 17,944-17,655 could be the range for the Nifty in the near-term.

Asian shares subdued

Asian share markets were muted on Monday as investors count down to another US inflation reading (US CPI on Wednesday) that could well set the seal on an early rate hike from the Federal Reserve, lifting bond yields and punishing tech stocks.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan added 0.2 percent, while South Korea lost 1.0 percent. Chinese blue chips were little changed as recent policy easing was balanced by lingering concerns over the property sector.

US stocks close lower

US stocks ended lower Friday, in a turbulent session that concluded with all three major benchmarks suffering weekly declines, following a monthly jobs report whose headline figure came in far below economists’ estimates. For the week, Nasdaq Composite dropped 4.5 percent, its sharpest weekly decline since February 26.

In parsing the Labor Department report, investors appeared to conclude that the monthly employment update won’t derail the Federal Reserve’s intention to wind down accommodative policies and eventually hike rates to combat inflation in 2022.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury note rose 3.6 basis points Friday to 1.769 percent for the biggest weekly gain (27 bps) since September 2019 - pressuring growth stocks and bolstering financials.

US economy adds fewer jobs in December

On Friday, the Labor Department reported the US economy added far fewer jobs in December than expected. The non-farm payrolls report showed an increase of 199,000 in December, though economists had expected growth of 422,000, according to Dow Jones.

While the headline number disappointed, there were some things in this jobs report that pointed to an improving economic picture and higher inflation. Average hourly earnings increased by 0.6 percent, above expectations. And the unemployment rate fell to 3.9 percent, the lowest level since February 2020 and well below the 4.1 percent expected.

Dollar index flat

The dollar index was flat at 95.764, after falling 0.5 percent on Friday, but has support at 95.568. The euro bounced to $1.1354, leaving it near the top of the recent $1.1184/1.1382 trading range. The Japanese yen got a break from its recent bear run to stand at 115.64, as the dollar faded from last week's 116.34 peak.

Oil prices up

Oil prices eased in early trade, having climbed 5% last week helped in part by supply disruptions from the unrest in Kazakhstan and outages in Libya. Brent fell 28 cents to $81.47 a barrel, while US crude lost 36 cents to $78.54.

India GDP likely to grow 9.2% in FY22

India's GDP will likely grow 9.2 percent in FY22, according to the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation. The expansion of the Indian economy, as per the statistics ministry's first advance estimate of GDP for 2021-22 released on January 7, is lower than the forecast of 9.5 percent by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI).

Stocks under F&O ban on NSE

Two stocks – Delta Corp and RBL Bank – are under the F&O ban for January 10.

(With additional inputs from Reuters, agencies)

Published on: Monday, January 10, 2022, 09:25 AM IST