Nifty Ends Near Day’s High; IIP Contracts 3.6% in February; CPI Inflation Rises to 5.5% in March

Nifty, +1.4%; Sensex, +1.4%; Nifty Midcap, +1.7%; Nifty Smallcap, +1.3%; Model Portfolio, +1.0%

Market Pulse: Downtrend

Distribution Day Count: Seven

Nifty started the session on a flat note and was up about 1% in the first hour of trading. It pared gains in the next couple of hours and briefly turned negative. Strong buying in the second half helped Nifty close near its day’s high. Today’s volume was slightly lower than the previous session. Of Nifty50 stocks, 76% closed in the green, led by Mahindra & Mahindra (+7.9%) and Bajaj Finserv (+7.0%).

Barring Nifty IT (-3.3%) and Pharma (-1.2%), all sectoral indices closed in the green. Nifty PSU Bank (+4.5%) advanced the most, followed by Auto (+4.3%). Financial-related sectors, which dragged the market in the last few sessions, led the rally today. The advance-decline ratio was in favor of advancers. Of the 2,254 stocks traded, 1,386 advanced, 507 declined, and the rest remained unchanged.

Market Status Overview

- Yesterday, we moved the market to a Downtrend as Nifty breached its 50-DMA on higher volume, distribution day count increased to seven, and many leading stocks failed to hold their logical support levels.

- Today’s session will be considered day 1 of an attempted rally as Nifty traded above yesterday’s low of (14,249). We need two more such sessions to change the market status to a Rally Attempt.

- From there, we would prefer to see a [follow-through day] before shifting the market back to a Confirmed Uptrend. Should this occur, the focus will be on ideas breaking out of early-stage base patterns and showing the best relative strength, with good accumulation.