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Indian markets ended higher on Thursday with significant gains on the back of renewed hopes of a better earnings season, coupled with a broadbased rally led by gains in auto, IT and financial stocks. Today, markets are likely to open in red following weakness on Wall Street overnight. Traders will be eyeing the Bank loan and deposit growth data are scheduled to be released today. There may be some cautiousness amid Sensex’s weekly F&O expiry is scheduled today. However, some support may come later in the day amid foreign fund inflows. Foreign institutional investors net bought Indian equities worth Rs 1,506.75 crore on Thursday. Some optimism may come as Commerce and Industry Minister Piyush Goyal said the implementation process of free trade agreement (FTA) between India and the four-nation European bloc EFTA is progressing fast and is expected to come into force before the end of this year. Traders may take note of Labour Minister Mansukh Mandaviya’s statement that India created nearly 172 million fresh jobs between 2014 and 2024, of which 46 million were created in the last financial year, 2023-24. There will be some buzz in sugar stocks with report that India’s sugar consumption in 2024-25 sugar year (SY) is projected to be at 28 million tonnes, down by around 1.5 million tonnes from the previous year. The drop is largely attributed to the absence of major events like the 2024 General Elections since they were held in the summer months. Banking stocks will be in focus as ICRA in a report said credit growth may ease to 9.7-10.3 per cent in FY26, weighed down by the persisting high CD ratio and implementation of the proposed changes in the liquidity coverage ratio (LCR) framework. ICRA has revised its credit growth estimate downwards to 10.5-11 per cent for FY25 from its earlier estimate of 11.6-12.5 per cent. There will be some reaction in textile companies’ stocks as the government said India's textiles and apparel exports, including handicrafts, grew 7 per cent during the April-October period to $21.35 billion. The outbound shipments from the sector stood at $20 billion in the same period of the previous financial year, FY 2023-24. Oil & gas industry stocks will be in limelight as India Ratings and Research (Ind-Ra) said India's oil and gas demand is likely to remain strong in the next financial year even as weak global demand will drive down refining margins. The agency expects the credit profile of downstream companies to remain stable during the year, driven by healthy demand for petroleum products and healthy marketing margins that would offset compressed Gross Refining Margins (GRMs), yielding healthy overall EBITDA.

The US markets ended lower on Thursday amid choppy trading, as investors embarked on the new year facing the cross-currents of solid labor market data, a rising dollar and tumbling Tesla shares. Asian markets are trading mostly in green on Friday aiming to shrug off a lacklustre start to 2025.

Back home, extending their positive streak to the second consecutive day, Indian equity benchmarks ended higher with gains of around 2 percent each amid heavy buying in Auto, IT and Consumer Discretionary shares. Markets made an optimistic start and extended gains as the day progressed as traders took support with provisional data released by the government showing that the net goods and services tax (GST) collection grew marginally by 3.3 per cent Y-o-Y to Rs 1.54 trillion in December, amid an increase in refunds.  Some support also came with Agriculture Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan’s statement that the country's agriculture and allied sector is expected to grow at 3.5-4 per cent in 2024-25, marking a significant improvement from the 1.4 per cent rise recorded in FY24. Markets continued their rally in late afternoon deals and ended near day’s high points, taking support from a private report stating that the agri-tech sector is expected to create 60,000-80,000 new employment opportunities over the next five years. It said agritech addresses every aspect of farming, from water irrigation advancements for seeds, fertilisers, and pesticides to offering access to advanced farm machinery and market linkages for selling produce. Traders overlooked a survey showing that India’s manufacturing activity grew in December at its weakest pace for the year amid softer demand and despite easing cost pressures and strong jobs growth, dulling the outlook for the start of 2025. The HSBC final India Manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index, compiled by S&P Global, fell to 56.4 - the weakest since December 2023 - little changed from November’s 56.5 but below an early estimate that showed a rise to 57.4. Separately, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) has made integrated filing for Listing Obligations and Disclosure Requirements (LODR) effective for all disclosures starting with the quarter ending December 2024. The measures aim to ease compliance and simplify disclosure requirements by integrating periodic filings under two broad categories: governance and financial. Finally, the BSE Sensex rose 1436.30 points or 1.83% to 79,943.71, and the CNX Nifty was up by 445.75 points or 1.88% to 24,188.65.

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