Weak start in offing

Welcome to the last trading session of the week! In the last trading sessions, markets put up a good show, however, it rallied due to short-covering and bulls may not continue yesterday’s momentum since cues from global markets are subdued. The reason being the global markets are skittish, as a result of the coronavirus spread. Today, markets will solely be mirroring the global sentiments but that does not seem so, as of now. SGX Nifty which is currently trading almost 20 points below its yesterday’s close is indicating that we are headed for a depressed open and a shaky trading day. Key earnings to watch out today are Bank of Baroda and UltraTech Cement.  

Stock markets in Asia were seen trading lower on Friday. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng has lost 0.11 per cent and Japan’s Nikkei 225 has dropped 0.05 per cent, however, Chinese markets are closed for holiday.  

Back home, markets opened the session on a flat note but soon, got stronger in the initial hour of trade, however, some volatility was seen mid-way, but in the second half of the session, short-covering helped markets to close near the day’s high. BSE Sensex rose 0.66 per cent and Nifty surged 0.61 per cent. The broader market continues to outperform, Nifty mid-cap and small-cap are advancing 1.42 and 0.90 per cent, respectively. On the sectoral front, barring Nifty Media, all other indices closed in green. Nifty Realty, Nifty PSU Bank and Nifty Bank were the top performers.

In overnight developments, US markets started off Thursday’s session deep in the red, as worries over the spread of the coronavirus dented investor’s sentiments. However, sentiment started to improve as the WHO stated that it was ‘bit too early to consider this event is a public health emergency of international concern’. As a result, markets bounced off the lows of the day and ended on a mixed note. Dow slipped 26 points, while, S&P 500 and Nasdaq added 4 and 19 points, respectively. In economic news, jobless claims ticked higher and the index of leading economic indicators showed a slightly bigger than expected decrease. European equities were mostly lower, amid concerns about the impact of the coronavirus outbreak. European Central Bank (ECB) decided to leave key interest rates unchanged, as expected.