The Indian equity benchmarks are set to stage a gap up opening in special Muhurat Trading session to mark the festival of Diwali and beginning of Hindu New Year Samvat 2079. The Nifty futures traded on Singapore Exchange also known as the SGX NIfty Futures was trading above 17,850 mark indicating that Nifty 50 index would begin the special session above 17,850 amid strong global markets
The Nifty 50 index had closed at 17,576 on Friday.
Meanwhile, European markets were trading on a strong note, Britain’s FTSE 100 gained 0.7 per cent after former Prime Minister Boris Johnson announced he will not run to lead the Conservative Party. Former Treasury chief Rishi Sunak is now the favorite to replace Liz Truss, who quit last week after her tax-cutting economic package caused turmoil in financial markets.
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Germany's DAX jumped 1.8 per cent and France's CAC 40 index climbed 2 per cent.
Hong Kong’s benchmark plunged 6.4 per cent on Monday as dismay over a lack of fresh policy initiatives from a Chinese Communist Party congress overshadowed a report that the No. 2 economy grew at a faster pace in the last quarter.
The dollar rose to nearly 150 yen, a day after the Japanese central bank reportedly again moved to stem the yen’s decline.
Overnight, Wall Street capped a volatile run for stocks with a broad rally Friday, contributing to sizable weekly gains for major indexes.
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The S&P 500 rose 2.4 per cent and notched its biggest weekly gain since June. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 2.5 per cent and the Nasdaq composite ended 2.3 per cent higher.
Back home, foreign institutional investors bought shares worth Rs 439 crore while domestic institutional investors sold shares worth Rs 119 crore.
Stocks In Focus
ICICI Bank: The country's second largest private lender on Saturday reported a 31.43 per cent jump in its September quarter consolidated net profit at Rs 8,006.99 crore.
On a standalone basis, the second largest private sector lender reported a 37.14 per cent rise in September quarter net profit at Rs 7,557.84 crore, as against Rs 5,510.95 crore in the year-ago period.
The bank's total income grew to Rs 31,088 crore in the reporting quarter, while the overall expenses climbed to Rs 19,408 crore from Rs 18,027 crore.
The provisions reduced to Rs 1,644.52 crore as against Rs 2,713.48 crore in the year-ago period, but were up when compared with the Rs 1,143.82 crore in the June quarter.
Kotak Mahindra Bank: Kotak Mahindra Bank on Saturday reported an about 27 per cent rise in net profit at Rs 2,581 crore for the quarter ended September 2022.
The private sector lender had posted a net profit of Rs 2,032 crore in the same quarter of the previous fiscal year.
Total income during July-September period of 2022-23 grew to Rs 10,047 crore, as against Rs 8,408 crore in the year-ago quarter, Kotak Mahindra Bank said in a regulatory filing.
Net interest income increased to Rs 5,099 crore from Rs 4,021 crore in Q2 FY22, up 27 per cent.
Net interest margin for the quarter was at 5.17 per cent.
On the assets front, the bank's gross non-performing assets (or bad loans) stood at 2.08 per cent of gross advances at the end of September 2022, down from 3.19 per cent a year ago.
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Reliance Industries: Billionaire Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Industries Limited (RIL) on Friday reported net profit of Rs 13,656 crore for quarter ended September 2022, marking a decline of 0.17 per cent from Rs 13,680 crore during the same period last year. On a sequential basis, its profit dropped 24 per cent from Rs 17,955 crore in June quarter. The sharp decline in profit came after government imposed windfall tax on exports of refined petroleum products.
The company also said that it will commission its deepwater MJ gas condensate field in Bay of Bengal block KG-D6 by year end, boosting natural gas output to 30 per cent of India's total.
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"With respect to the MJ gas condensate field project being pretty much on track, for the first gas production by the end of the year," said Sanjay Roy, senior vice-president for exploration and production, Reliance Industries Ltd, at an investor call post announcement of the company's second quarter earnings.
MJ is the third and last of a set of discoveries that Reliance and its partner bp are developing in the eastern offshore block. The two will use a floating production system at the high sea in the Bay of Bengal to bring to production the deepest gas discovery in the KG-D6 block.
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JSW Steel: Steel prices appear to have reached their bottom and are likely to go up from their current levels if supply adjustments globally are any indication in the sector, a top JSW Steel official said on Sunday.
Steel prices fell around 40 per cent to Rs 55,000-57,000 a tonne in the domestic market.
IDFC First Bank: IDFC First Bank on Saturday reported a 266 per cent jump in its net profit at Rs 556 crore for the quarter ended September 2022 on the back of strong growth in core operating income.
The private sector lender had posted a net profit of Rs 152 crore in the same quarter a year ago.
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Its core operating income (excluding trading gains) rose by 35 per cent from a year ago to Rs 3,947 crore in Q2 of 2022-23 fiscal year, it said in a regulatory filing.
Net interest income climbed 32 per cent at Rs 3,002 crore, while fee and other income spurted by 44 per cent to Rs 945 crore in the September quarter of FY23.
RBL Bank: Mid-size lender RBL Bank on Saturday said a massive drop in provisions boosted its bottom-line by almost seven times to Rs 202 crore in the quarter to September from Rs 31 crore in the year-ago period.
The bank, which has been down in the dumps since 2019, had a provision of Rs 651 crore in the September 2021 quarter, including Covid-19 related provisions, which fell to about Rs 241 crore in the reporting quarter, R Subramaniakumar, the managing director of the bank told reporters at the earnings call.
On the asset quality side, the bank overall performed better with gross NPAs improving to 3.80 per cent from 4.08 per cent but net NPAs rose to 1.26 per cent from 1.16 per cent on a sequential basis and the provision coverage ratio including for technical write-offs fell to 84.3 from to 85.3 in June 2022.
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