Sensex, Nifty Rebound From Day's Lows, Nifty Bank Index Soars 3%
The benchmark indices have rebounded from the lows of the day on the back of a stellar rally in ICICI Bank and gains in other banking shares. As of 10:03 am, the Sensex has recouped more than 500 points from the lows of the day and was trading at 61,074.50, higher by 240 points or 0.40 per cent and the Nifty was at 18,166.75, up 50.50 points or 0.29 per cent. The Nifty Bank has zoomed more than 3 per cent to surpass the 41,400 mark.
The broader markets, are however, underperforming their largecap indices, with the BSE Midcap index and BSE Smallcap index shedding 1.8 per cent and 1.6 per cent respectively.
In the currency market, the rupee had depreciated 14 paise to 75.04 against the U.S. dollar in opening trade on October 25, weighed down firm crude oil prices and a muted trend in domestic equities. At the interbank foreign exchange, the rupee opened on a weak note at 74.98, then fell further to 75.04.
Banking shares are in the limelight post the ICICI results. ICICI Bank has surged over 13 per cent to hit a 52-week high of Rs 867 on the BSE after the bank reported a 29.6 per cent rise in net profit to Rs 5,511 crore in the quarter ended September 2021 compared to Rs 4,251.3 crore in the year-ago period. The bank's net non-performing assets (NPAs) declined to Rs 8,161 crore in the September quarter from Rs 9,306 crore in the preceding April-June quarter.
Among other banking shares, Axis Bank has soared 5 per cent and Kotak Mahindra Bank has erased its earlier losses and edged higher by 0.4 per cent ahead of their results scheduled on Tuesday i.e. October 26. And SBI has extended its recent gains by adding another 1.5 per cent. In the midcap banking space, RBL Bank and Federal Bank have gained around 2 per cent each.
Among other index heavyweights, L&T and M&M have gained up to a per cent each on the BSE.
On the other hand, Bajaj Auto, Asian Paints and HCL Tech are trading lower by around 2 per cent each on the BSE. And Tech Mahindra has slipped by 1.2 per cent to Rs 1,500 ahead of its September quarter results today.
The overall market breadth is extremely weak. Out of 3,394 shares traded on the BSE, there are 966 advancing shares as against 2,252 declines.
