sensex news today: ET Market Watch: 5 key factors behind today’s stock market rally

Hello and welcome to a brand-new episode of ET MARKET WATCH – your daily podcast for daily market updates. I am Neha Vashishth Mahajan, let’s hear the top highlights of the day.

Sensex was up 700 points intraday today while Nifty touched 22,600 intraday as well At the time of closing, Sensex was up 487 pts while Nifty was up 168 pts. Here are the factors behind today’s rally:

1. Buying in Banks
Axis Bank was the top contributor in the surge as it jumped over 6% intraday post strong Q4 earnings. Other top contributors were ICICI Bank and SBI. The Nifty Bank index shot up by over 300 points at the closing.

2. Global Markets
Major Asian indices traded in the green. China’s Shanghai Comp index was .30% higher, Hang Seng gained nearly half a percentage point. Bangkok, Manila were up too. Although Japan was down due to the falling Yen.

3. Monthly Expiry
Thursday is also the day of monthly expiry and the May series begins on Friday. Investors tend to square off positions ahead of expiry.

4. Oil
Oil prices dropped as worries about a possible US economic slowdown, and the chance of interest rate cuts being delayed were seen as more important than concerns about increased conflict in the Middle East. Brent was at $87.96 while US WTI was at $82.7 per barrel.

5. Dollar index
It was down 0.2% at 105.6, while Asian currencies slipped, pressured by an uptick in US bond yields. The rupee remained unchanged at 83.3225 per US dollar.