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Indian markets closed higher for a fourth straight session on Friday tracking gains in blue chips like L&T, Infosys and M&M, amid strength in other global markets. Today, markets are likely to continue their northward journey with positive start amid mixed global cues. Investors will be eyeing the RBI and US FOMC's latest meeting minutes to be out later in the week. Some support will come as India’s outward foreign direct investment (FDI) commitments rose by 25.7 per cent on a year-on-year (Y-o-Y) basis to $2.09 billion in January 2024, compared to over $1.66 billion in January 2023. Traders will be taking encouragement as India’s G-20 Sherpa and former NITI Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant said India needs to grow at an annual rate of 9-10 per cent for around three decades and constant innovations to become a $35 trillion economy by 2047. Traders may take note of a State of India's Digital Economy Report, 2024, by Indian Council for Research on International Economic Relations (ICRIER), stating that India is the third largest digitalised country in the world, only behind the United States of America (USA) and China. Besides, Ashima Goyal, an external member of the Reserve Bank of India's (RBI) Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) has said India's headline inflation rate should “soon” come down to core inflation levels. Meanwhile, the government has operationalised the central processing centre for processing filings under the companies law and LLP Act in a “time-bound and faceless manner” as part of efforts to further improve the ease of doing business. However, there may be some cautiousness as latest data by Reserve Bank of India (RBI) showed that India's foreign exchange reserves dipped by of $5.24 billion to $617.23 billion for the week ending on February 9. IT stocks will be in focus as Nasscom’s - Strategic Review 2024: Rewiring Growth in the Changing Tech Landscape - showed that with the Indian information-technology (IT) industry’s growth rate falling to a low single digit, the ambition of becoming a $350 billion industry by 2026 seems a difficult task. The sector is expected to touch $253.9 billion in FY24, growing at 3.8 per cent year-on-year. Growth has fallen from the 8.4 per cent in the previous financial year. Stocks related to defence industry will be in limelight with a report that the Defence Ministry has given approval for a proposal to buy nine maritime surveillance aircraft for the Indian Navy and six maritime patrol aircraft for the Indian Coast Guard.

The US markets ended lower on Friday as yields rose on the back of steeper-than-expected rise of 0.3 per cent in US Producer Price Index for January as against 0.1 per cent expectation. Asian markets are trading mixed on Monday as China equities opened higher on resuming trade after a one-week holiday and after China’s central bank left rates untouched on Sunday.

Back home, Indian equity benchmarks closed higher for a fourth straight session and gained over half a percent on Friday amid strength in other global markets.  After an optimistic start, markets edged gradually higher as traders took encouragement with the government data showing that India's exports rose to a three-month high of 3.12 per cent to $36.92 billion in January despite global uncertainties including the Red Sea crisis, while the trade deficit narrowed to a nine-month low of $17.49 billion. After recording negative growth for two months in a row, imports grew by about 3 per cent to $54.41 billion in January. Domestic sentiments remained up-beat with Commerce Secretary Sunil Barthwal’s statement that the negotiations for the proposed India-UK free trade agreement are at an advanced stage, and both sides are working to iron out differences on the remaining issues. A positive momentum continued over the Dalal Street in late afternoon deals, taking support from statutory body, Employees' State Insurance Corporation’ (ESIC) latest provisional payroll data showing that 18.86 lakh new employees have been added in the month of December 2023. Around 23,347 new establishments have been registered and brought under the social security umbrella of the Employees’ State Insurance Scheme in the month of December 2023, thus ensuring coverage to more workers. Some support also came with the commerce ministry stating that the next round of negotiations between India and South American nation Peru for a free trade agreement (FTA) is expected to start in April 2024. The proposed agreement is aimed at promoting bilateral trade and investments between the two countries. Traders took note of a report by the Centre for Economics and Business Research (CEBR) stating that it has been a remarkable year for equities with the Nifty 50 rallying 22 percent in 2023 and the Sensex gaining 20 percent in the same period. Besides, it said India is currently a $3.7 trillion economy and is expected to grow to about $6 trillion by 2030 and $10 trillion by 2035. Finally, the BSE Sensex rose 376.26 points or 0.52% to 72,426.64 and the CNX Nifty was up by 129.95 points or 0.59% to 22,040.70.

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