Market Opening Bell: NIFTY50 holds on to 22,800 mark, SENSEX rises 100 points; steel stocks surge

The Indian stock market on Wednesday, March 19, opened positive for the third session despite mixed signals from the global markets.

At 11:56 AM, the S&P BSE SENSEX was up 146.31 points, or 0.19%, at the 75,447.57 level, while NSE’s NIFTY50 was at the 22,896.60 level, rising 62.30 points, or 0.27%.

However, the market breadth was largely in favour of positives, as 1,982 stocks advanced on the NSE out of 2,443 stocks traded during the opening session.

As many as 33 stocks on the NIFTY50 index were trading in the green and 17 in the red.

Tata Steel, JSW Steel, BPCL, NTPC and State Bank of India were the most contributing stocks, gaining as much as 2.07% on NIFTY50.

Shares of steel manufacturers like SAIL, JSW Steel, Tata Steel, and Jindal Steel & Power rallied in the early trade as DGTR has recommended the imposition of a 12% provisional safeguard duty for 200 days on certain steel products to protect domestic players from a surge in imports.

Meanwhile, after a long break, the foreign institutional investors (FIIs) turned net buyers on Tuesday, putting ₹694.57 crore in the domestic stock market, which witnessed a stellar rally after remaining subdued or in negative territory for multiple sessions.

Globally, the Asian markets opened mixed on Wednesday morning as Japanese markets traded in the green with over 200 points gained, and Chinese and Hong Kong indices opened in the red with moderate losses.

Japan's Nikkei was 0.69% higher, staying near the levels it traded at before the decision.

Wall Street snapped a two-day rally to close 1% lower on Tuesday as a tech sell-off intensified the losses. Market participants remained cautious ahead of the Federal Reserve’s policy decision scheduled to be released today.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 260.32 points, or 0.62%, to 41,581.31, the S&P 500 lost 60.46 points, or 1.07%, to 5,614.66, and the Nasdaq Composite lost 304.55 points, or 1.71%, to 17,504.12.

As many as 2,541 stocks traded on the NSE during the early session, among which only 2,063 stocks were trading in the green, only 402 in the red and 76 shares remained unchanged.

This indicated that the market breadth was in favour of bulls.

As many as 31 stocks hit their one-year high in the early trade, while only 53 stocks touched their 52-week low.

Further, 76 stocks hit their upper circuits while 21 hit their lower circuits.

India VIX, the volatility gauge, was trading 1.38% higher at 13.39 levels.

Extending its gains, the broader market opened in positive territory. Nifty Midcap 100 trading 0.99% higher at 50,006.65 levels and Nifty Smallcap 100 at 15,525.20 levels, rising 0.98%.

The stock rose 4% to ₹7.39 apiece on the National Stock Exchange (NSE) at 9:22 am. The company's market capitalisation stands at ₹52,759.45 crore.