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Indian markets slipped from intra-day record highs to close flat on Wednesday. Today, the start of a day of F&O expiry of August contracts likely to be cautious amid mixed Asian cues. Also, volatility may creep in the markets as investors are keeping their powder dry ahead of the Jackson Hole Symposium. There will be some cautiousness as India recorded a massive spike of 46,307 new Covid-19 cases in the past 24 hours out of which, over 31,000 were from Kerala. The country also witnessed 608 deaths, taking the death toll to 436,396. So far, India has recorded 32,557,677 corona cases in total. Traders may take note of report that finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman said State-run banks will undertake a nation-wide loan outreach programme around October, as the government seeks to stir economic growth through sustained credit push, especially to Covid-hit small and medium businesses, retail and farm sectors, amid fears that bankers have turned risk-averse. Meanwhile, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has extended its card tokenisation services to any token requestor, including consumer devices such as laptops, desktops, wearables (wrist watches, bands, etc.), Internet of Things (IoT) devices, etc. Tokenisation refers to generating random numbers instead of the actual card numbers keyed in during transactions. There will be some buzz in sugar industry stocks as the Centre hiked the minimum price that mills have to pay to sugarcane growers, also known as the Fair and Remunerative Price (FRP), by Rs 5 per quintal to Rs 290 a quintal for 2021-22 (October-September) sugar season while ruling out any immediate commensurate increase in the sale price of sugar. Auto stocks will be in focus as SIAM President Kenichi Ayukawa said the Indian automobile industry is going through a deep structural slowdown and the COVID-19 pandemic has further impacted the sector pushing it back by many years. Ayukawa noted that all auto segments like passenger vehicles and two-wheelers have witnessed a drastic drop in growth rates over the last 5-10 years. There will be some reaction in insurance industry stocks with a private report that the government is mulling allowing foreign direct investment (FDI) in the country's largest insurer LIC, a move which would help overseas investors take part in the company's proposed mega IPO.

The US markets ended higher on Wednesday extending recent uptrend amid continued optimism about growth and on hopes the Federal Reserve might not begin tapering its bond-buying program anytime soon. Asian markets are trading mixed on Thursday after South Korea became the first country to raise interest rates in the pandemic era.

Back home, Indian equity benchmarks ended flat amid the volatile session on Wednesday, a day ahead of the monthly F&O expiry session. Some buying interest is seen in selected Oil & Gas, Power and Energy stocks while some pressure is seen in Consumer Durables, Telecom and Realty stocks. Market opened positively and stayed in green for most part of the day, with positive comments by the World Health Organisation (WHO) chief scientist on the Covid-19 situation in India. He said coronavirus in India may be entering some kind of stage of endemicity where there is low or moderate level of transmission going on. Some optimism also came in as Minister of State of Commerce and Industry Anupriya Patel said India is likely to record exports worth $46 billion to the ASEAN region. She noted that as one of the largest destinations for Indian exports, the Association of South East Asian Nations will be an important region for India in meeting the global export target of $400 billion in financial year 2021-22. Domestic sentiments remained positive in late afternoon deals, taking support with Chief financial advisor (CEA) Krishnamurthy V Subramanian’s statement that India is well-poised to climate the ripple impact of taper tantrum if the US Federal Reserve begins to cut back its $120-billion-a-month quantitative easing later this year. Some support also came with private report stated that India has overtaken the United States (US) to become the second-most sought-after manufacturing destination globally, driven mainly by cost competitiveness. However, markets erased gains and closed on a flattish note, as traders turned wary with the Asian Development Bank (ADB) stating that the coronavirus pandemic may have pushed as many as 80 million people in developing Asia into extreme poverty last year, threatening to derail progress on global goals to tackle poverty and hunger by 2030. Finally, the BSE Sensex fell 14.77 points or 0.03% to 55,944.21, while the CNX Nifty was up by 10.05 points or 0.06% to 16,634.65.

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