Indian stocks off to weak start to truncated trading week

New Delhi: Indian stocks opened the fresh week on a tepid note, after a one-hour bumper Muhurat trade on Diwali evening.

Benchmark Nifty and Sensex were about 0.4 per cent lower each at the time of filing this report. Sensex rose as high as about 500 points, to later erase some of its initial gains during Muhurat trading, marking the bright start to Samvat 2080 for Indian stocks.

During the one-hour window between 6.15-and 7.15 pm yesterday, investors placed orders for stocks according to their wishes which they believed to be auspicious and would bring in good returns.

Diwali, dedicated to worshipping the Goddess of Wealth, marks an auspicious day for new purchases and people tend to grab onto some form of financial investment.

The market will remain closed on Tuesday for Diwali-Balipratipada. Normal trade will resume on Wednesday.

“The good beginning for Samvat 2080 with a 100 point rally in Nifty is indicative of the bullish sentiment in the market. The market is climbing walls of worries posed by 2 wars and a slowing global economy. This happens in a bull market. Investment strategy should be based on this basic understanding of market behaviour,” said VK Vijayakumar, Chief Investment Strategist at Geojit Financial Services.

“An important feature of the market is that it is up-trending despite sustained FPI selling. This means that even if FPIs continue to sell, the market will remain resilient if the selling is in small quantities. Of course, big selling by FPIs will negatively impact markets,” Vijayakumar added.

Foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) sold stocks worth Rs 14,768 crore and Rs 24,548 crore, and Rs 5,806 crore, respectively, in September, October, and so far in November, data from National Securities Depository showed.

According to Ajit Mishra, SVP – Technical Research, Religare Broking, “The coming week is a holiday-shortened one and the performance of the global indices, especially the US markets, will be on participants’ radar for cues.”

“While all sectors are witnessing rotational buying, we feel the contribution of banking would be critical for momentum else the rise could be gradual,” said Mishra.