Indian stock indices ended largely steady on Thursday after a volatile session that saw intraday swings of nearly 600 points.
Investors remained cautious ahead of key developments — the anticipated India-US trade deal and the outcome of the Bihar elections, with counting scheduled for Friday.
The Sensex closed at 84,478.67 points, up 12.16 points or 0.014 per cent, while the Nifty settled at 25,884.90 points, higher by 9.10 points or 0.035 per cent. During the day, the Sensex touched an intraday high of 84,919 points and a low of 84,253 points.
Although the gains were marginal, both benchmarks extended their winning streak for a fourth consecutive session. Analysts noted that profit-booking erased early gains despite largely positive global and domestic cues.
“Given the prevailing volatility and mixed global backdrop, traders are advised to maintain a cautious buy-on-dips approach, especially when using leverage. Partial profit booking during rallies and the use of tight trailing stop-losses will be vital for effective risk management,” said Amruta Shinde, Technical and Derivative Analyst at Choice Equity Broking Pvt Ltd.
According to VK Vijayakumar, Chief Investment Strategist at Geojit Financial Services, the market needs fresh catalysts to move to new record highs.
“With the Bihar poll outcome largely discounted by the market, there are no immediate political triggers to push the market significantly higher. The reverse might happen if the actual results deviate from exit polls,” Vijayakumar said.
He added that the key economic factor to watch would be a potential India-US trade deal, which could remove penal tariffs and reduce reciprocal duties.
“The decline in October retail inflation in India to 0.25% raises the possibility of a rate cut by the MPC in December. However, weak monetary policy transmission remains a challenge for the RBI,” he noted. “In the near term, the market is likely to consolidate and respond to triggers as they emerge. If multiple positive cues occur simultaneously, short-covering could push the market sharply higher — but sustaining that uptrend will be difficult amid continued FII selling and high valuations.”
So far in 2025, the Sensex and Nifty have posted cumulative gains of around 8 per cent. In 2024, both indices rose by about 9–10 per cent, while in 2023 they surged 16–17 per cent. In contrast, 2022 saw modest gains of just 3 per cent.
“The benchmark Nifty maintained a bullish tone for most of the session, supported by positive sentiment and selective buying across key sectors. However, the momentum weakened near the psychological 26,000 mark, triggering profit-booking that erased early gains. As a result, the index closed below 25,900 with a marginal uptick of 0.01%,” said Sudeep Shah, Head of Technical and Derivatives Research at SBI Securities.
(ANI)