Market Wrap Podcast, December 28: All that happened in the markets today

Headline indices extended gains on Tuesday on the back of all-round buying as investors sidelined Omicron related fears.

The BSE Sensex, surged to an intra-day high of 57,952, and ended 477 points up at 57,897. The NSE Nifty touched a high of 17,250, and settled with a gain of 147 points at 17,233.

Some analysts, Business Standard spoke to, remain hopeful that the equity markets will look past Omicron fears and move higher. Despite, multiple headwinds, including the policies of various global central banks amid the rising Covid cases with the emergence of the omicron variant, they believe that there would not be any major fall in the markets over the short-term but do not rule out bouts of volatility going ahead.

The broader indices also closed with smart gains. The BSE Midcap index was up 1 per cent, and the SmallCap index gained 1.5 per cent.

Asian Paints and Sun Pharma were the major gainers among the Sensex 30 stocks, up nearly 3 per cent each. Mahindra & Mahindra, Titan, NTPC and UltraTech Cement also rallied more than 2 per cent each. 

Larsen & Toubro, HCL Technologies, Tech Mahindra, Reliance Industries, and Infosys, were the other prominent gainers. 

Individually, debutant Supriya Lifescience stole the limelight as the active pharmaceutical ingredient manufacturer got listed on the BSE at Rs 425- a 55% premium over its issue price of Rs 274. The stock that had received strong response from investors, ended 42 % higher on the exchange.

Further, the shares of BSE surged up 10.5% to a high of Rs 2,028 on the National Stock Exchange, after the company announced that its board will meet on February 8, 2022 to consider a bonus issue. In the past one month, the stock has outperformed the market by surging 30%, against a 1.1 % rise in the Nifty50 index.

In the broader market, state-owned telecom services provider MTNL continued its upward movement for the fourth straight day. The stock was locked at the 10% upper circuit on the BSE, with only buyers seen on the counter. The stock traded at its highest level since June 2014. So far in December, its share price has appreciated by 117 %. 

That apart, two other stocks-Urja Global and 63 Moons Technologies have also surged over 100% in the last one month. Urja Global was locked in the 5% upper circuit for the 15th day, while 63 Moons hit a 52-week high on the BSE being locked in the same upper circuit.

Cinema theatre player PVR ended 4% lower on the BSE after Delhi ordered closure of cinemas, gyms, schools and colleges, with immediate effect, amid various other restrictions. The new restrictions have been enforced as the national capital is seeing a new spike in covid cases, possibly led by the Omicron variant. 

Moreover, the telecom space overall put up a good performance on the back of the Department of Telecommunications announcing the initial roll out of commercial 5G services in 13 Indian cities in 2022. Other sectors that were leading gainers included Auto, IT, Realty, and Consumer Durables. 

The Nifty Pharma index also logged gains and closed 0.9% higher after health minister Mansukh Mandaviya said that India has granted emergency approval to Merck's anti-Covid pill Molnupiravir and two new covid-19 vaccines. The minister said that the pill will be manufactured by 13 companies in India. It was granted  emergency approval by the US FDA last week.

Lastly, Bitcoin slid below $50,000, a level some analysts see as a key pivot for assessing the largest cryptocurrency’s outlook heading into 2022. The token fell as much as 4.5% in Asia and was trading at about $49,100 as of 1:10 p.m. in Singapore. Second-largest coin Ether and the Bloomberg Galaxy Crypto Index were also in the red.