Barometers near day`s high; Nifty above 15,650

The benchmark indices were trading near the day`s high in afternoon trade. Global stock markets jumped amid cooling commodity prices. The lower commodity prices are expected to help the manufacturing sector by easing their input costs. It will also help control overall inflation. The Nifty traded above the 15,650 mark. Barring the Nifty IT index, all the other sectoral indices on the NSE traded in the green. Banks and auto shares were in demand.

At 13:20 IST, the barometer index, the S&P BSE Sensex, was up 348.65 points or 0.67% to 52,614.37. The Nifty 50 index gained 109.85 points or 0.71% to 15,666.50.

The broader market outperformed the frontline indices. The S&P BSE Mid-Cap index and the S&P BSE Small-Cap index rose by 1.20% each.

Buyers outnumbered sellers. On the BSE, 2324 shares rose and 878 shares fell. A total of 137 shares were unchanged.

Mahindra & Mahindra (up 3.34%), Bajaj Finance (up 3.05%), Hero Motocorp (up 2.37%), Hindustan Unilever (up 2.36%) and Indusind Bank (up 2.19%) were top Nifty gainers.

Tech Mahindra (down 1.43%), Infosys (down 1.11%), HCL Technologies (down 0.97%), Apollo Hospitals Enterprise (down 0.79%) and NTPC (down 0.48%) were major Nifty losers.

Global Markets:

The Dow Jones index futures were up 135 points, indicating a positive opening in the US stocks today.

Shares in Europe and Asia rose across the board on Friday, as investors are now hopeful that rising consumer prices will be brought under control as commodities prices pulled back sharply.

U.K. retail sales fell 0.5% month-on-month in May, while April`s monthly rise in sales was revised down sharply from 1.4% to 0.4%.

Core consumer prices in Japan rose 2.1% for the month of May compared to a year earlier, in line with estimates. That`s above the Bank of Japan`s target of 2% inflation.

Wall Street`s main indexes posted solid gains on Thursday, fuelled by strong performance from defensive and tech shares that outweighed declines for economically sensitive groups as worries persisted about a potential recession.

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell on Thursday reiterated that the central bank is "strongly committed" to bringing down inflation, as he spoke on monetary policy for a second day before Congress. He also noted that a recession is a "possibility," a fear that has continued to weigh on Wall Street.

The largest US banks on Thursday easily cleared the Federal Reserve`s annual health check. The results of the Fed`s annual "stress test" exercise showed the banks have enough capital to weather a severe economic downturn and paves the way for them to issue share buybacks and pay dividends.

On Thursday, the Labor Department said U.S. weekly jobless claims fell 2,000 to a seasonally adjusted 229,000 for the week ended June 18, showing the labor market remains tight.

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