SENSEX rises over 350 points, NIFTY above 23,300 led by Reliance Industries

The Indian equity benchmarks were trading higher on Wednesday, defying weak cues from Asian markets, powered by gains in index heavyweight Reliance Industries. The SENSEX rose as much as 436 points and NIFTY50 index touched an intraday high of 23,350 led by buying in heavyweights like Reliance Industries, ICICI Bank, Hindustan Unilever, HDFC Bank, State Bank of India, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Infosys and ITC.

As of 9:27 am, the SENSEX was up 358 points at 74,272 and NIFTY50 index advanced 89 points to 23,330.

Asian markets were trading lower as geopolitical tensions flared up in West Asia after United States and Iran carried out a fresh round of military action against each other amid no signs of a peace deal from the third round of ongoing negotiations.

Japan's Nikkei declined 1.04%, China's Shanghai Composite fell 0.66%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng dropped 1% and South Korea's KOSPI dropped 3.43%.

Crude oil prices jumped to above $92 per barrel (bbl) during the early market hours on Wednesday, June 10, after the United States and Iran carried out a fresh round of military action against each other amid no signs of a peace deal from the third round of ongoing negotiations.

During Tuesday’s evening commodity market session, global benchmark, Brent crude oil prices dropped to near $89 per bbl only to later surge by 4.4% intraday to a high of $93 per bbl during morning market hours, India time.

Back home, 10 of 15 major sector gauges compiled by the National Stock Exchange (NSE) were trading higher led by the NIFTY FMCG index's 1.5% gain. NIFTY Bank, Private Bank, Financial Services, Oil & Gas and Consumer Durable indices also rose between 0.2% and 1.5%.

On the flip side, metal, auto, pharma and select PSU banking shares were facing selling pressure.

Broader markets were trading on a subdued note as NIFTY Midcap 100 index declined 0.2% and NIFTY Smallcap 100 index fell 0.12%.

Reliance Industries was top gainer in the NIFTY50 index, the stock rose as much as 2.5% to hit an intraday high of ₹1,300 after Facebook-parent Meta announced that it has tied up with Mukesh Ambani’s RIL for an AI-enabled data centre in India.

Reliance will build a data centre with 168 MW capacity in Jamnagar, Gujarat, which Meta will lease, with options to scale.

Mark Zuckerberg, Founder and CEO of Meta, said that the facility, located in Jamnagar, Gujarat, reaffirms Meta’s deep commitment to India, bringing infrastructure that powers its products and AI capabilities needed to deliver “personal superintelligence” to one of its largest and fastest-growing communities globally.

Meanwhile, RIL, in its press release on Wednesday, also announced the partnership with Meta Platforms, Inc. (“Meta”) for a data centre project in Jamnagar, Gujarat.

Nestle India, Hindustan Unilever, Tata Consumer Products, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Asian Paints, Trent, Bajaj Finance, ICICI Bank and Apollo Hospitals also rose between 0.75% and 2.4%.

On the other hand, Hindalco, Adani Enterprises, Coal India, Tata Steel, Adani Ports, Tata Motors PV, Shriram Finance and Eternal were top losers in the NIFTY50 index.

The overall market breadth was marginally positive as 1,474 shares were advancing while 1,276 were declining on the NSE.