Gift NIFTY futures hint at gap up opening amid strong cues from Asian peers

The Indian equity benchmarks are set to stage a gap up opening on Monday, October 5, as indicated by the NIFTY futures traded at Gift City in Gandhinagar. Gift NIFTY futures advanced 115 points to 22,645 amid positive cues from Asian markets after bond yields in United States eased and crude oil dropped in global markets.

The benchmarks fell for a fourth straight session on Thursday tracking a surge in bond yields in the United States, relentless selling by the foreign institutional investors and rising crude oil in global markets.

The SENSEX fell as much as 1,187 points and NIFTY50 index touched an intraday low of 22,217 dragged down by losses in index heavyweights like Reliance Industries, Mahindra & Mahindra, Larsen & Toubro, ITC, ICICI Bank, Maruti Suzuki and Bharti Airtel.

The SENSEX dropped 571 points to close at 71,910 and NIFTY50 index fell 198 points to close at 22,422.

Meanwhile, most of the Asian markets were trading higher as rate hike bets in US eased on the back of weak September jobs data and declining crude prices.

US jobs report showed US employers added fewer workers than forecast in September and wage growth slowed, prompting money markets to price in less than a 25% chance of an October Fed hike, Bloomberg reported.

Australia's S&P ASX 200 index advanced 0.3%, Japan's Nikkei surged 2.6% and Hong Kong's Hang Seng slipped 0.23%.

Markets in China and South Korea were closed on account of holiday.

US stocks ended close to their record highs on Friday as softer US job market cooled worries about spiralling inflation.

Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.5%, S&P 500 index advanced 0.73% and tech heavy Nasdaq index surged 1.2%.

Crude exports from the region exceeded pre-war levels on September 24 and between September 27 and 29, rising to between 19.5 million barrels per day and 22.5 million bpd, provisional data from ship-tracking firm Kpler showed.

Back home, foreign institutional investors sold shares worth ₹9,484.22 crore while domestic institutional investors bought shares worth ₹10,041.84 crore on Thursday.

HDFC Bank shares will be in focus after the country's largest private sector lender announced appointment of Anup Bagchi as the next chief executive and managing director, with the RBI clearing his name to lead the largest private sector lender on Thursday, October 1.

Meanwhile, the bank's average advances under management were ₹31,872 billion for the September 2026 quarter, a growth of around 14.0% over ₹ 27,946 billion for the corresponding September 2025 period. The Bank’s period end advances under management were approximately ₹ 33,075 billion as of September 30, 2026, a growth of around 15.3% over ₹ 28,688 billion as of September 30, 2025.

IT shares will be in focus after Accenture exceeded its CEO Julie Sweet said that Accenture exceeded its revenue growth guidance range and capped off another year of broad-based growth across businesses.

New bookings came in at $22.2 billion, an increase of 4% in US dollars and 5% in local currency for the quarter, and $84.5 billion for the year.