Stock market today: BSE Sensex, Nifty50 in red after hitting fresh lifetime highs

Stock market today: BSE Sensex and Nifty50, the Indian equity benchmark indices, hit lifetime highs in opening trade on Wednesday, before slipping in red. While BSE Sensex hit an all-time high of 80,481.36, Nifty50 saw a fresh high of 24,461.05. At 9:20 AM, BSE Sensex was trading at 80,195.88, down 156 points or 0.19%. Nifty50 was at 24,397.40, down 36 points or 0.15%.
According to Nagaraj Shetti of HDFC Securities, the Nifty’s underlying trend remains positive.After surpassing the crucial overhead resistance of 24400 levels (1.618% Fibonacci extension), the Nifty could potentially reach another significant resistance level of 24960 (1.786% Fibonacci extension) in the near future. The immediate support level is at 24250.
“Overall we expect markets to trade with a positive bias and take cues from upcoming inflation data, Q1FY25 earnings, and budget. Pharma sector is likely to remain in focus over next few days on back comfortable valuation and expectation of healthy earning growth in Q1,” said Siddhartha Khemka, Head – Retail Research, Motilal Oswal
In global markets, S&P 500 futures were steady as of 9:43 a.m. Tokyo time, while Japan’s Topix remained unchanged. Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 experienced a 0.5% decline, and Euro Stoxx 50 futures rose by 0.3%.
The dollar strengthened on Wednesday after recovering from a three-week low following Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell’s cautious statements regarding the timing of potential interest rate cuts. Traders closely monitored the New Zealand dollar for indications about the timing of possible policy adjustments ahead of the central bank’s rate decision.
Several stocks are under the F&O ban today, including India Cements, IEX, ABFRL, Bandhan Bank, PEL, GNFC, Chambal Fertilisers, Indus Tower, and Balrampur Chini Mills.
Foreign portfolio investors turned net buyers, purchasing shares worth Rs 314 crore on Tuesday, while domestic institutional investors also bought shares worth Rs 1,416 crore. The net long position of FIIs increased from Rs 3.77 lakh crore on Monday to Rs 3.85 lakh crore on Tuesday.