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Indian markets ended the Monday’s trading session in positive territory, riding on the back of heavy buying across banks, IT, and financial services stocks. Today, markets are likely to open in green tracking gains in global peers. Also, sharp fall in crude oil prices overnight likely to aid domestic sentiments. Oil prices fell as OPEC lowered its outlook for global oil demand growth in 2024 and 2025 and a media report that Israel is willing to strike Iranian military and not nuclear or oil targets. Sentiments will get boost as John Chambers Chairman, US-India Strategic Partnership Forum said that Indian administration has set the stage for growth, not for the next five years but for the next twenty-five years. He added being the fastest-growing economy in the world by the end of the century India will become much bigger than China in terms of GDP. Besides, Sebi Whole-time Member Ananth Narayan G reminded investors that Indian equities have consistently delivered 15 per cent returns over the last 5 years whereas the same has been zero or even negative in China. Traders may take note of US-India Strategic Partnership Forum President and CEO Mukesh Aghi’s statement that exports are going to be a major job creator for India as the country moves towards becoming a $5 trillion economy. Aghi also stressed that India and the US should continue to strengthen their economic engagements and increase the bilateral trade to $500 billion going forward. However, upside may remain capped after the government data showed that soaring vegetable prices pushed the retail inflation rate to a nine-month high of 5.49 per cent in September 2024. The consumer price index (CPI)-based retail inflation rate was 3.65 per cent in August and 5.02 per in September 2023. The previous high inflation rate was witnessed in December 2023 at 5.69 per cent. Some cautiousness may come after index heavyweight - Reliance Industries reported lower-than-expected numbers with around 5 per cent fall in the July-September quarter net profit as weak oil refining and petrochemical business hurt operational performance. Its consolidated net profit fell to Rs 16,563 crore in July-September - the second quarter of the current fiscal - compared to Rs 17,394 crore in the same period a year back. Port & shipping sector stocks will be in focus as Icra said the overall cargo volumes are expected to see a healthy year-on-year growth of 9-11 per cent to 3.6-3.7 million tonnes this fiscal year on the back of estimated higher domestic and international cargo volumes while the outlook on airport infrastructure is stable. Investors will continue to keep close eye on earnings of India Inc for more directional cues.

The US markets ended higher on Monday as investors bought into technology stocks ahead of a busy week packed with corporate earnings and crucial economic data. Asian markets are trading mostly in green on Tuesday supported by a strong Wall Street close and investor optimism about corporate earnings.

Back home, Indian equity benchmarks traded with a positive bias throughout the day and ended higher by over half percent each on Monday driven by gains in Realty, banking and IT stocks. After an initial uptick in the morning trade, the indices remained rangebound for the rest of the day as investors look forward to earnings reports from Reliance Industries and HCL Technologies, marking the start of a results-packed week. Additionally, India’s Consumer Price Index (CPI) data for September is in focus for indications of a potential interest rate cut. Traders took support as the Income-Tax (I-T) Department’s latest data showed that India’s net direct tax collection, after adjusting for refunds, grew 18.35 per cent to Rs 11.3 trillion between April 1 and October 10 of FY25. In the same period last year, tax collection stood at Rs 9.51 trillion. Some support also came with Secretary of the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), Amardeep Singh Bhatia, stating that the government is targeting to provide access to the PM GatiShakti national master plan (NMP) portal to the private sector this year, and discussions are underway for details. He said there are some layers of data, which are sensitive in nature on the NMP and those should not be exposed. However, further gains got restricted as some concern came with report that India’s wholesale inflation based on wholesale price index (WPI) increased to 1.84% in September 2024 from a four-month low of 1.31% it had hit in the previous month due to increase in prices of food articles, food products, other manufacturing, manufacture of motor vehicles, trailers & semi-trailers, manufacture of machinery & equipment, etc.  Traders also remained cautious as the government data showed that India’s industrial production turned negative as it contracted by 0.1 per cent in August, mainly due to a decline in the mining and power generation sectors’ output, in addition to an almost flat expansion in the manufacturing sector. Besides, exchange data showed Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) offloaded equities worth Rs 4,162.66 crore on Friday, while Domestic Institutional Investors (DIIs) bought equities worth Rs 3,730.87 crore. Finally, the BSE Sensex rose 591.69 points or 0.73% to 81,973.05, and the CNX Nifty was up by 163.70 points or 0.66% to 25,127.95.

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