Mumbai, After witnessing sharp falls over the past two sessions, Indian stock markets witnessed a slight rebound on the back of value buying to close on a flat note after a volatile trading session on Wednesday.
Investors resorted to value buying at lower levels after a massive rout seen during Monday’s trade.
Nevertheless, the session remained volatile during the day as the stock markets — S&P BSE Sensex and NSENify50 — glided through the red and green territories during the day.
Consequently, the Sensex closed at 35,697.40, higher by 62.45 points or 0.18 per cent from the previous close of 35,634.95. It had opened at 35,468.90 and had touched an intra-day high of 36,021.51 and a low of 35,261.92 points.
Similarly, the NSE Nifty50 on the National Stock Exchange inched-up by 6.95 points or 0.07 per cent to close at 10,458.40 from its previous close.
Among the sectoral indices, energy, telecom, capital goods and banking stocks were among the gainers while realty, oil and gas, metal and IT stocks witnessed heavy selling.
Broader market indices like the BSE mid-Cap and small-Cap indices lost more, thereby underperforming the Sensex and the Nifty.
Major Asian markets have closed on a negative note, whereas European markets were trading in the green.
In the previous trading session, the Indian equity market had witnessed a bloodbath with the BSE Sensex registering its biggest single day fall in its history as it closed 1,941 points lower.
The plunge was due to the persistent concerns of the coronavirus epidemic severely impairing the global economy, coupled with the crash in the crude oil markets witnessed earlier on Monday.
“Technically, while the Nifty has ended on a flat note, the short term trend remains down,” said Deepak Jasani, Head of Retail Research at HDFC Securities.
“The Nifty could test the recent lows of 10,295-10,138 in the near term. Any pullback rallies could find resistances at 10,744-10,828.”
Vinod Nair, Head of Research at Geojit Financial Services, said: “Global impact of coronavirus which is still spreading at a high rate in countries other than China and the collapse of oil prices are having a catastrophic effect. Rate cuts and stimulus measures are not working at the time being.”
“Even though risk concerns continue to remain elevated, inflow into domestic equity mutual fund surged to the highest level in 11 months indicating investor confidence on a long term perspective.”
“Going ahead, rate sensitive stocks are likely to remain focused as consensus estimates show CPI inflation for the month of February eased to 6.80 per cent. But the market expects the RBI to cut rates in the next policy.”
Siddhartha Khemka, Head – Retail Research, Motilal Oswal Financial Services, said: “Though the market has bounced back today, it is likely to remain under pressure till the coronavirus spread doesn’t slow down.”
“However, with this correction, the earnings yield have turned higher than bond yields thus providing attractive entry points into many fundamentally strong companies. Until we see a semblance of normalcy returning, we would advise traders to stick to selective buying into quality stocks.”
