Opening Bell:
Gift Nifty is up by 55.0 points in the early morning trade, indicating a positive opening for Indian stock market.
Thursday saw a downturn in Asian markets, influenced by the previous night’s losses on Wall Street. This decline comes just before the imminent release of US GDP and inflation data. Japan’s Nikkei 225 fell by 1.31%, and the Topix declined by 1.18%. South Korea’s Kospi experienced a 0.36% drop, while the Kosdaq saw a 0.2% decrease. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index futures indicated a weaker opening, and Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 declined by 0.57%.
On Wednesday, the upward momentum in Wall Street, fueled by declining interest rates and a more accommodative stance from the Federal Reserve, abruptly reversed with a mid-afternoon plunge. All three major U.S. stock indexes declined significantly by 1.3 percent to 1.5 percent from Tuesday’s closing figures. The Dow Jones Industrial Average experienced a drop of 1.27 percent, The S&P 500 followed suit, losing 1.47 percent, Similarly, the Nasdaq Composite fell by 1.5 percent.
Stocks News:
👉 Mazagon Dock Shipbuilders: The state-owned shipbuilding company has signed a contract worth Rs 1,600 crore with the Acquisition Wing of the Ministry of Defence for the construction and delivery of six next-generation offshore patrol vessels (NGOPVs) for the Indian Coast Guard (ICG).
👉 ICICI Bank: The Reserve Bank of India has approved the re-appointment of Sandeep Batra as Executive Director of the bank with effect from December 23, 2023, to December 22, 2025. This renewed term of two years is within the five-year term as previously approved by the shareholders.
👉 Cochin Shipyard: The company has signed a contract worth ₹488.25 crore with the Ministry of Defence for short refit of an Indian Naval ship.
👉 UltraTech Cement: The country’s largest cement company, has entered into a Share Subscription and Shareholders Agreement to acquire 26 percent of the equity shares of Clean Max Terra for Rs 20.25 crore. Clean Max Terra is engaged in the generation and transmission of renewable energy. The acquisition is to meet the company’s green energy needs, optimising energy costs, and comply with regulatory requirements for captive power consumption under electricity laws.
👉 Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) net sold shares worth Rs 1,322.08 crore, while domestic institutional investors (DIIs) bought Rs 4,754.34 crore worth of stocks on December 20, provisional data from the National Stock Exchange (NSE) showed.
Domestic and International Events
- A statistical model developed by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) has pegged India’s GDP growth for next year at 6.0 percent, 50 basis points lower than the central bank’s official forecast of 6.5 percent mentioned in the October edition of its Monetary Policy Report. “As part of the suite of models for informing monetary policy formulation, the RBI has developed a dynamic stochastic general equilibrium (DSGE) model,” the central bank’s monthly State of the Economy article, released on December 20, said.
- The country’s total debt, or the total outstanding bonds which are being traded in the market, rose to USD 2.47 trillion (Rs 205 lakh crore) in the September quarter, according to a report. The total debt amount in the March quarter of the previous fiscal was USD 2.34 trillion (Rs 200 lakh crore). The central government’s debt stood at USD 1.34 trillion, or Rs 161.1 lakh crore, in the September quarter, up from USD 1.06 trillion, or Rs 150.4 lakh crore, in the March quarter, Vishal Goenka, Co-Founder of Indiabonds.com, said, quoting data provided by the Reserve bank of India.
- Oil prices edged higher on Wednesday amid concerns over global trade disruptions and tensions in the Middle East following attacks on ships by Yemen’s Houthi forces. However, unexpected increases in US crude inventory and record domestic oil production limited the gains. Brent crude settled at $79.70 a barrel (up 0.6%), while US West Texas Intermediate settled at $74.22 a barrel (up 0.4%).
- Gold prices were largely unchanged on Wednesday, while traders braced for a slew of economic data due later in the week that could offer fresh clues on the US central bank’s monetary policy path. Spot gold fell 0.2 percent to $2,035.97 per ounce, as of 2:27 p.m. ET (1927 GMT). US gold futures settled 0.2 percent lower at $2047.7.
Key Equity Indices
| EMERGING | LATEST | % 1D |
| Hang Seng | 16,614 | 0.7 % |
| Shanghai Composite | 2,902 | (1.0) % |
| DEVELOPED | LATEST | % 1D |
| Dow Jones | 37,082 | (1.3) % |
| DAX | 16,733 | (0.1) % |
| FTSE 100 | 7,716 | 1.0 % |
| Nikkei | 33,676 | 1.4 % |
| Straits Times | 3,108 | (0.3) % |
