The markets on Thursday morning opened higher with Sensex at 66,878.08, up by 170.88 points and Nifty was at 19,828.80 with a gain of 50.50 points. Bajaj Finance, Infosys, Axis Bank, L&T, Power Grid were the top gainers in the morning session, whereas Mahindra and Mahindra, Tech Mahindra, Hindustan Unilever, Nestle and UltraTech Cement were among the losers.
Nestle, Ujjivan Small Finance Bank, ACC, Tata Teleservices, Bajaj Finserv, Trident, Indian Hotels, Symphony, Indian Bank, Sundram Fasteners, Indus Towers, Sona BLW Precision Forgings, Ajanta Pharma, RailTel Corporation of India, Arvind, Nipon Life India Asset Management, Astec Lifesciences, Macrotech Developers, Bharat Electronics, Laurus Labs, Birlasoft, Dr Lal PathLabs, Coromandel International, JK Lakshmi Cement, Home First Finance, Intellect Design Arena and Indian Energy Exchange shares will be in focus today as they announce their first quarter results.
Markets on Wednesday
The benchmark indices ended on a positive note on Wednesday. Sensex was up 344.06 points to end the day at 66,699.77 and Nifty was up 93.30 points at 19,773.90.
Global markets
US markets closed flat on Wednesday after the Federal Reserve lifted its benchmark overnight interest rate by 25 basis points opening the door for further hikes. However, Dow Jones continued with a 13-day winning streak. The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 82.05 points at 35,520.12, the S&P 500 closed 0.71 points lower at 4,566.75 and Nasdaq Composite dropped 17.27 points at 14,127.28.
The Asian stock markets were trading higher on Thursday with Hong Kong's Hang Seng gaining 177.28 points to 19,542.42, South Korea's KOSPI saw a rise of 25.25 points at 2,617.61, Japan's Nikkei 225 climbed 13.39 points to 32,681.73 and GIFT Nifty exchange added 44.50 points to trade at 19,850.50.
Oil prices
Oil prices were higher on Thursday morning as investors focused on signs of tighter supplies and the hike in interest rates helped reverse some previous days losses. Brent crude futures rose 36 cents to $83.28 per barrel and US West Texas Intermediate crude jumped to $79.26 per barrel up by 48 cents.
Rupee
Indian rupee opened higher on Thursday at 81.93 per dollar against Wednesday's close of 82.
