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Snapping two day losing streak, Indian equity benchmarks ended the Monday’s trade with a gain of around a percent, setline above their crucial 56,300 (Sensex) and 16,750 (Nifty) levels, as traders went for bargain hunting after a worldwide slump for financial markets spurred by worries about how badly the omicron variant, inflation and other forces will hit the world economy. Markets started the day on an optimistic note as sentiments remained up-beat as a Commerce Ministry official said Indian exports showed a turnaround after December last year and are still going strong. Traders also took some support as Prime Minister Narendra Modi assured India Inc that the government would focus on reducing the compliance burden while exhorting the top companies to make full use of the production-linked incentive (PLI) scheme. Markets extended gains as additional optimism came with report that the Asian Development Bank (ADB) will provide $350 million loan to improve access to urban services in India by accelerating policy actions and reforms to enhance service delivery and promote performance-based central fiscal transfers to urban local bodies (ULBs).

However, market participants booked half of their early gains in last leg of trade as traders remained watchful amid report that India has recorded 200 cases of the Omicron coronavirus variant across 12 states, mostly in the western state of Maharashtra and the nation's capital New Delhi. Some cautiousness came with report that Formal job creation in the country slowed down in October with 1.27 million new jobs added under the Employees’ Provident Fund Organisation. This is the lowest after July when 1.23 million subscribers were added. Net new additions under EPFO stood at 1.36 million in August and 1.54 million in September. Despite profit booking in later part of the day, local bourses managed to end with a decent gains as traders continued looking for beaten down but fundamentally strong stocks.

Global cues too provided support to domestic markets with all the European counterparts were trading in green with a jump in commodity stocks offsetting concerns about the Omicron coronavirus variant. Asian markets ended mostly in green terrain as traders went for bargain hunting after a worldwide slump for financial markets spurred by worries about how badly the omicron variant, inflation and other forces will hit the world economy. Meanwhile, Chinese markets cheered Beijing's move to help troubled property firms, although surging cases of the Omicron coronavirus variant remain a worry for investors.

Back home, traders took note of report that the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) released the model rules, paving the way for the roll out of the new global tax regime that will subject multinational corporations to a minimum tax of 15% from 2023. On the sectoral front, automotive industry remain in focused, as credit rating agency, India Ratings and Research (Ind-Ra) in its latest report has showed the 28.4% sequential decline in the domestic auto sales volumes (excluding CVs) in November 2021. The overall production and sales volumes decreased 26% yoy and 32% yoy, respectively, in November 2021.

Finally, the BSE Sensex gained 497.00 points or 0.89% to 56,319.01 and the CNX Nifty was up by 156.65 points or 0.94% to 16,770.85.       

The BSE Sensex touched high and low of 56,900.74 and 56,047.22, respectively and there were 23 stocks advancing against 7 stocks declining on the index.  

The broader indices ended in green; the BSE Mid cap index surged 1.43%, while Small cap index up by 1.29%.

The top gaining sectoral indices on the BSE were Metal up by 2.99%, Consumer Durables up by 2.17%, Basic Materials up by 2.14%, Telecom up by 1.72% and TECK was up by 1.68%, while there were no losers on the BSE sectoral front.

The top gainers on the Sensex were HCL Tech up by 3.91%, Wipro up by 3.66%, Tata Steel up by 2.98%, Tech Mahindra up by 2.29% and Ultratech Cement up by 2.24%. On the flip side, Power Grid Corporation down by 1.50%, Axis Bank down by 1.31%, Bajaj Finance down by 0.82%, SBI down by 0.75% and Mahindra & Mahindra down by 0.58% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, Joint Secretary in the Department of Commerce Amitabh Kumar has said Indian exports showed a turnaround after December last year and are still going strong, while global trade took a hit during the COVID-19 pandemic. Kumar also stressed on increasing India’s share in global exports, which currently stand 1.6 per cent, and also highlighted the need to change the duty structure for some goods. Kumar said ‘Global trade was disrupted significantly during the pandemic. However India’s exports showed a turnaround since December 2020 onwards and performing extremely well thereafter. However, the full potential of trade remains to be tapped. We have to work continuously to increase India’s share in global exports from the current 1.6 per cent’.

He further said ‘We understand that there is a need to bring in required changes in the duty structure of some of the goods in our country’.  He said ‘In so far as the merchandise trade performance is concerned, the government is closely monitoring and pushing hard for a target driven merchandise export performance of $400 billion in the current fiscal by engaging with all stakeholders across states and reaching the districts’. He added ‘Export growth has been robust in 2021-22. Merchandise exports remained above US dollars 30 billion for 7 consecutive months during April to October, and October in particular was an unusually high export performance period with the highest ever merchandise exports being recorded at US dollars 35.65 billion’.

Kumar said the total merchandise export during April to November 2021 was valued at $262.5 billion, a growth of 50.7 per cent as compared to $174.16 billion in April to November 2020-21. He added that the top five export items in April to November 2021-22 were engineering goods, petroleum products, gems and jewellery, organic and inorganic chemicals, and drugs and pharmaceuticals. He said the Department of Commerce is engaging with five countries or regions - the EU, the UK, Canada, Australia and the UAE - for early conclusion of a free trade agreement or FTA.

The CNX Nifty traded in a range of 16,688.25 and 16,936.40 and there was 39 stocks advancing against 11 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were HCL Tech up by 3.89%, Wipro up by 3.73%, UPL up by 3.58%, Adani Ports up by 3.41% and Tata Steel up by 3.00%. On the flip side, Power Grid Corporation down by 1.55%, Axis Bank down by 1.26%, Bajaj Finance down by 0.85%, Cipla down by 0.79% and SBI down by 0.71% were the top losers.

European markets were trading in green; France’s CAC gained 32.07 points or 0.47% to 6,902.17, Germany’s DAX rose 109.64 points or 0.72% to 15,349.31 and UK’s FTSE 100 was up by 62.72 points or 0.87% to 7,260.75.

Asian markets settled mostly higher on Tuesday, after falling heavily in the previous session on concerns that the new coronavirus strain Omicron could derail the global economic recovery. Chinese and Hong Kong shares rose as real estate shares extended their rebound as investors cheered efforts by policymakers to prevent a contagion from financial woes at China Evergrande Group and several other heavily indebted developers. Seoul shares gained with bargain hunting after the key index's recent drop over Omicron tensions. Japanese shares rebounded by strong gains in tech heavyweights.

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