Market LIVE: Sensex higher, Nifty above 14,600 in choppy trade; Wipro jumps 8%

Share Market LIVE Updates: So far today, the Sensex has touched a high of 48,997.81 and a low of 48,694.49 while Nifty has moved in a range of 14,559-14,653. Nifty IT index was up 1% led by Wipro, Mindtree

Indian markets were volatile as investors worried about the surge in covid cases in the country and the WPI inflation soaring to an eight-year high. India reported over 2 lakh new COVID-19 cases and more than 1,100 deaths in the last 24 hours.

India reports over 2 lakh covid cases for second straight day

India reported over 2 lakh new COVID-19 cases and more than 1,100 deaths in the last 24 hours, according to the Union Health Ministry on Friday.

As many as 2,17,353 new COVID-19 cases have been reported in India in the last 24 hours, pushing the caseload to 1,42,91,917.

The cumulative number of COVID-19 vaccine doses administered in the country stands at 11,72,23,509 till today.

Oil steady near four-week highs on demand revival

Oil prices dipped in early trade on Friday but were on course for a weekly gain of more than 6% with an improved oil demand outlook and strong economic recoveries in China and the US offsetting concerns about spikes in COVID-19 infections.

Brent crude futures fell 17 cents, or 0.3%, to $66.77 a barrel, following a 36 cent rise on Thursday.

U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures were down 19 cents, or 0.3%, to $63.27 a barrel, after climbing 31 cents on Thursday.

China's Q1 GDP grows at record 18.3%

China's economy expanded at its fastest pace on record in the first quarter of 2021, data showed Friday, in a sharp turnaround from the historic contraction caused by the coronavirus outbreak.

The world's second largest economy was the only major one to grow at all in 2020, supported by strong retail spending and industrial activity as well as better-than-expected exports as the virus hit markets around the world.

Wipro gains after Q4 results

Wipro Ltd on Thursday posted a net profit of ?2,972.3 crore, a nearly 28% increase from the year-ago period, on the back of higher revenues. The profit was above consensus Bloomberg estimates of ?2,873.7 crore.

The Bengaluru-based company’s revenues for the fourth quarter grew 3.4% year-on-year (y-o-y) to ?16,245.4 crore on broad-based growth across sectors. The dollar revenue for the IT services segment grew 3.8% annually to $2.15 billion, driven by strong volume growth, making it the best fourth quarter in a decade.

Sputnik V deliveries to India to begin in April, says Indian envoy Venkatesh: ANI

The first batch of Russia's COVID-19 vaccine Sputnik V will be delivered to India this month, the TASS news agency reported, citing Indian Ambassador to Russia, Bala Venkatesh Varma.

"What we heard from companies is that by (the end of) this month, the first shipment will take place and the production will be (launched) there in May and slowly increase," Bala Venkatesh told reporters.

Venkatesh said vaccine production in India will be ramped up gradually, and may exceed 50 million doses per month.

Bank Nifty; Sumeet Bagadia, executive director at Choice Broking

Bank Nifty is trading in a range of 30,700-33,000. A breakout on either side will decide positive or negative sentiment for the index. But, the major trigger for the market in India is the number of fresh COVID-19 cases being reported and how the US market is performing. Since, there is no such rise in the COVID cases in India and the US market has closed on higher side, banking index is expected to remain positive.

Bond yields surge after first tranche of G-SAP purchase

Yields of 10-year government bonds surged 12 basis points (bps) to 6.127% on Thursday after the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) bought ?25,000 crore of securities from the secondary market, in the first tranche of its Government Securities Acquisition Plan (G-SAP 1.0), at yields higher than the market expected.

The cut-off yield on 10-year bonds was fixed at 6.0317% against 6% estimated in a Bloomberg survey.

SGX Nifty futures trade flat

SGX Nifty futures were at 14,597.80, down 0.02% from previous close, hinting at tepid start for domestic indices.

Asian equities little changed, await cues from China data release

Asian shares were little changed on Friday ahead of a raft of Chinese economic data, while world stocks on the whole flew at a record level, fuelled by strong U.S. economic data that may herald a solid recovery ahead.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan were little changed while Japan's Nikkei ticked up 0.2%.

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng gained 0.47%; Korea’s Kospi was flat while China’s Shanghai Composite index edged 0.3% higher.

Wall Street scale record highs on robust earnings from large banks

Wall Street stocks surged to fresh records on Thursday following robust earnings from large banks and strong US economic data which showed recovery picking up speed.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average climbed 0.9% to a record 34,035.99, and the first close above 34,000. The broad-based S&P 500 also ended at a record, gaining 1.1% to 4,170.42, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index jumped 1.3% to finish at 14,038.76.

Data released showed that U.S. retail sales in March jumped 9.8% from February, racing past economists’ forecasts of a 5.5% growth.

Also, 576,000 people applied for unemployment benefits last week, well below the 700,000 that economists had forecast and down from 769,000 the prior week. It's also the lowest the number has been since the pandemic.

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