Benchmarks trade flat; India Vix down over 2%

The domestic equity barometers traded near the flat line with some positive bias in afternoon trade. The Nifty was trading above the 18,200 mark after hitting a low of 18,163.80. Auto, banks and financial stocks corrected while metal, pharma and healthcare shares advanced.

At 12:24 IST, the barometer index, the S&P BSE Sensex, was up 46.57 points or 0.08% to 61,196.61. The Nifty 50 index added 27.45 points or 0.15% to 18,239.80 .

In the broader market, the S&P BSE Mid-Cap index rose 0.22% while the S&P BSE Small-Cap index was gained 0.52%.

The market breadth was almost even. On the BSE, 1,696 shares rose and 1,632 shares fell. A total of 103 shares were unchanged.

Economy:

India`s retail inflation rose sharply to 5.59% in the month of December from 4.91% in November, pushed up by rising prices of manufactured items, data released by the government showed on Wednesday. Inflation as measured by Consumer Price Index (CPI) was 4.59% in the year-ago period.

Separately, industrial production for the month of November grew by 1.4% as compared to (-)1.6 % in the same month last year. IIP surged 3.2% in the month of October.

Derivatives:

The NSE`s India VIX, a gauge of market`s expectation of volatility over the near term, fell 2.24% to 16.7975. The Nifty 27 January 2022 futures were trading at 18,270.90, at a premium of 31.1 points as compared with the spot at 18,239.80.

The Nifty option chain for 27 January 2022 expiry showed maximum Call OI of 17.1 lakh contracts at the 18,500 strike price. Maximum Put OI of 36.2 lakh contracts was seen at 17,000 strike price.

Buzzing Index:

The Nifty Auto index shed 0.25% to 11,617.30. The index had advanced 1.45% to end at 11,645.90 yesterday.

Mahindra & Mahindra (up 1.10%), Bharat Forge (up 1.06%), TVS Motor Company (up 0.79%), Bajaj Auto (up 0.41%), Eicher Motors (up 0.39%) and Hero MotoCorp (up 0.12%) advanced while Maruti Suzuki (down 1.37%), Ashok Leyland (down 0.97%) and Tata Motors (down 0.82%) declined.

COVID-19 Update:

India reported 2,47,417 new cases in the last 24 hours. The daily positivity rate stood at 13.11%. The country`s active caseload currently stands at 11,17,531. Active cases stands at 3.08% of the total infections and recovery rate currently stands at 95.59%. There were 84,825 recoveries in the last 24 hours, which increases total recoveries to 3,47,15,361.

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