Asian share markets are higher today as Chinese and Hong Kong shares show gains. The Shanghai Composite is up 1.5% while the Hang Seng is up 1%. The Nikkei 225 is trading up by 1.2%. US stocks ended more than 1% higher on Friday though well off the day's highs after the announcement of a partial trade deal between the United States and China.
Back home, India share markets opened higher today. The BSE Sensex is trading up by 133 points while the NSE Nifty is trading up by 31 points. The BSE Mid Cap index and BSE Small Cap index opened up by 0.2% and 0.3% respectively.
Sectoral indices have opened the day on a mixed note with metal stocks and realty stocks witnessing maximum buying interest. IT stocks and Consumer durables stocks are trading in red.
The rupee is currently trading at 70.91 against the US$.
Foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) have withdrawn over Rs 62 billion in just the first two weeks of October.
FPIs pulling out a significant amount of money in October raises alarm as this has been a truncated trading month with several market holidays already.
Out of the over Rs 62 billion withdrawal, foreign investors have pulled out over Rs 45 billion from equities and over Rs 10 billion from the debt market.
Reportedly, believe the fear of a global recession as well as a potential trade war is hurting market sentiment.
They also feel the consistent cuts in Gross Domestic Product (GDP) forecasts for India are spooking the market.
Now, let's have a look at the monthly foreign investor inflow trend over the last five years.
During the entire period, the net foreign investor inflows into Indian equities are worth Rs 1,182.8 billion. For a five-year period, that's not a significant amount at all. The reason being that, foreign investors have also done some heavy selling during this period.
Foreign investors have been net sellers in 27 out of the last 61 months. Even in the ongoing financial year, foreign investors have been net sellers.
Will that change after the latest announcement by the Finance Minister?
Research analyst at Equitymaster, Ankit Shah believes that corporate tax cuts have the potential to revive the business and investment climate in the economy.
In his premium newsletter Insider, Ankit focuses on cherry-picking the best investing opportunities. Even after the jump in stock prices on Friday, many stocks are still trading below their best buy prices.
He believes, the best strategy in the current market is to accumulate quality stocks in a staggered manner as and when prices are attractive.
Moving on to another news. The country's foreign exchange reserves surged by US$ 4.2 billion to touch a record high of US$ 437.8 billion in the week to October 4, according to the latest data from the Reserve Bank of India.
In the previous week, the reserves had surged by massive US$ 5 billion to US$ 433.6 billion.
The increase in reserves in the reporting week was on account of rise in foreign currency assets (FCA), a major component of the overall reserves.
FCA increased by US$ 4 billion to US$ 405.61 billion in the week ended October 4.
Expressed in US dollar terms, the foreign currency assets include the effect of appreciation or depreciation of non-US units like the euro, pound and the yen held in the foreign exchange reserves.
During the week, gold reserves increased US$ 232 million to US$ 27.2 billion.
The country's reserve position with the IMF also increased by US$ 9 million to US$ 3.61 billion, the data showed.
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