Rise With Profit: US Job Openings Data, Brent Crude Prices, Marico Q2 Results

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A check on the global markets at the start—Wall Street mostly saw gains, with the Nasdaq hitting record highs and the S&P 500 rising. The Dow dropped, but by only about 150 points. It’s a busy week on the earnings front there, with most of the so-called magnificent seven posting their results.

There was also news on the US economy. Job openings dropped to the most since 2021 in September, but according to a Reuters report, nearly all the declines in vacancies were in the south of the country. That’s probably because of the disruption caused by recent hurricanes Helene and Milton.

But the weaker report on the labour front was countered by other data that pointed to a rise in consumer confidence to a nine-month high. All of this is important ahead of the meeting of the Federal Reserve Open Market Committee next week.

In the Asia Pacific region this morning, it’s a mixed start—two of the three early risers were trading lower. The Nikkei 225 was higher by 1% last I checked.

We’ve also been tracking the price of oil all of this week. The price of Brent crude has fallen further and now hovers just below $71 to the barrel. That’s in anticipation of the planned increase in output by the OPEC plus, and after the unwinding of the risk premium associated with a major escalation in the ongoing war in West Asia.

Meanwhile, international gold prices hit all-time highs overnight and are, in fact, staying there as of this morning. We’re now very close to $2,800 per troy ounce. That’s because of safe haven demand amid swirling uncertainty, ahead of the US presidential election and the ongoing geopolitical tensions in various parts of the world.  

That translates to a price of nearly 80,000 per 10 grams here in India. And that’s why gold sales on Dhanteras are estimated to have dropped 10% in volume terms year-on-year, according to the Chairman of the All India Gem And Jewellery Domestic Council.

In other news back home, Bharti Airtel’s Managing Director Gopal Vittal has said that the opportunity to take up tariff hikes in the future is very high. The most recent tariff hike was done in July this year, which prompted an increase of around 70 paisa per day. Vittal explained that the return on capital employed for the company is still very low at 11.2% and the only way to improve this is another round of tariff hikes.

In earnings, there’s lots to talk about, but I’m focused on Marico Ltd. It posted a 20% rise in its consolidated net profit in the second quarter of the current financial year, beating analysts' estimates.

Revenue grew 8% to Rs 2,664 crore in the quarter and that was in line with estimates.

And in national news, trouble seems to be mounting for Gujarat-based journalist Mahesh Langa who was arrested in a GST fraud case earlier this month. Langa has also been booked in a case of unauthorised possession of official document, and has now been named in a third FIR, or first information report related to an alleged Rs 28-lakh fraud. Meanwhile, the Enforcement Directorate has launched a probe as well.