Geopolitical tensions keep markets on the edge

financialexpress.com:

Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) continued to pull out money from the Indian market on Thursday leading to benchmark indices falling for the second consecutive day. Higher interest rate in the US coupled with geopolitical tensions in the Middle East have kept their spirits muted for quite some time.

The Sensex closed 248 points, or 0.38% lower at 65,629.24, while Nifty 50 extended losses by 46 points, or 0.24% to close at 19,624.70. In the past couple of days, the Sensex has fallen 800 points while the Nifty-50 has slipped over 200 points.

In this month, FIIs have withdrawn $1 billion or Rs 8,327 crore in the so far till October 18. Whereas the domestic institutional investors have pumped in around Rs 15,000 crore. Thursday’s provisional figures showed that FIIs were net sellers of Rs 1,093 while DIIs bought shares worth Rs 736 crore.

“There is a bit of uncertainty at this point in time because of the war, which is why the markets are looking a bit subdued,” said Ashutosh Mishra, head, of research- Institutional Equities at Ashika Stock Broking.

The markets will be range-bound over the next 10-15 days despite good results, with oil and gas sectors as well as its dependent sectors such as power and metals continuing to face volatility in the near term, he added.

However, experts pointed out some optimism in the equity market given “global efforts to stabilise the conflict in West Asia which de-escalated the crude prices.”

Brent crude oil prices cooled off from Wednesday’s $91.50 per barrel to $90.19 per barrel, as of 4:50 p.m. on Thursday. Mishra pointed out that the market is still waiting for clarity to emerge regarding the geopolitical conflict in the Middle East.

The mid-cap and small-cap indices fell a little