Opening Bell:
SGX Nifty is up by 32.0 points in the early morning trade, indicating a negative opening for Indian stock market.
Asian markets were lower as electronics giant Samsung Electronics posted a 94 percent year-on-year drop in operating profit for the first quarter.. Shares in Japan are off as the Nikkei 225 drops 0.40%. The Hang Seng is down 0.11% while the Shanghai Composite in China is unchanged. The tech-heavy Nasdaq closed slightly higher 0.47% on Wednesday after strong Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O) results boosted technology shares, but the S&P 500 down by 0.38% and the Dow fell by 0.68% on lingering concerns about a weakening U.S. economy and the banking sector.
Stocks News:
?Bajaj Finance reported a 30% rise in net profit for the quarter ended March 2023 as demand for loans remained strong. Net profit increased to ₹3,158 crore in the January-March quarter up from ₹2,420 crore a year ago.
?Hindustan Unilever is expected to see a 13 percent on-year jump in both topline and bottomline for the quarter ended March 2023. The company will announce its Q4 FY23 results on April 27 during market hours.
?SBI Life Insurance Company has declared a net profit of Rs 777 crore for the fourth quarter of the fiscal year 2022-23, which is 15 percent higher against Rs 672 crore clocked in the year-ago period. The gross written premium (GWP), a key metric to assess the insurance company’s fiscal health, jumped by 15 percent in the entire FY23 to Rs 67,320 crore.
?HDFC Life Insurance on April 26 reported consolidated net profit of Rs 361.97 crore for the March quarter of FY23, down 28.49 percent from Rs 506.19 in the year-ago period. Profit after tax for FY23 stood at Rs 1,360 crore, up 13 percent. The company said this is despite the increased new business strain arising from higher growth in Q4.
?Foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) have net sold shares worth Rs 1,257 crore on Tuesday. DIIs, on the other hand, bought stock worth Rs 228 crore.
Domestic and International Events
- El Nino, heavyweight oil cartel’s surprise output cut and banking risks in some advanced economies pose threat to India’s real economic growth target. However, there are other positives that can soothe macroeconomic woes, while India remains on course to be the fastest growing economy in this fiscal year.
- The government has released Rs. 2874 crore to the beneficiaries of the production linked incentive scheme till March 2023 with a majority of companies from eight sectors like electronics, telecom, pharma and food processing.
- Oil prices rose on Thursday, paring earlier losses that were fuelled by U.S. recession fear and increased Russian oil exports dulling the impact of OPEC production cuts.
- Gold eased back on Wednesday as yields recovered with the focus returning to upcoming economic data, after briefly breaking above $2,000 spurred by fresh worries surrounding the U.S. banking turmoil.
Key Equity Indices
| EMERGING | LATEST | % 1D |
| Hang Seng | 19,757 | 0.7 % |
| Shanghai Composite | 3,264 | (0.0) % |
| DEVELOPED | LATEST | % 1D |
| Dow Jones | 33,302 | (0.7) % |
| DAX | 15,796 | (0.5) % |
| FTSE 100 | 7,853 | (0.5) % |
| Nikkei | 28,416 | (0.7) % |
| Straits Times | 3,294 | (0.1) % |
