NIFTY opened the day at 18,719 with a gap-up of 23 pts. Market is having a fear of sudden fall and everyone started booking profits with a small gap-up opening. But the index took support from a previous all-time high (ATH) near 18,600. Nifty closed the day at 18,701, up by 4 points or 0.03%.

BANK NIFTY started the day at 43,269 with a gap-up of 165 pts. Once again the zone below 43k acted as support and the index recovered in three sessions. Bank Nifty closed the day at 43,332, up by 229 pts or 0.53%.

FIN NIFTY started the day at 19,300 with a gap-up of 50 pts. After the strong recovery, the index faced good resistance at the 19,320 level. Fin Nifty closed the day at 19,297, up by 47 pts or 0.25%.

Nifty Metal (+1.8%) and Nifty PSU Bank (+1.2%) gained more than 1%. Others closed mixed.

Major Asian Markets closed in the green. European Markets are trading mixed.

Today’s Moves

No stop for Metals stocks- Hindalco (+4.3%), Tata Steel (+3.4%), Hindzinc (+2.8/%), National Aluminum (+2.8%), Hind Copper (+2.3%), JSW Steel (+1.8%), Vedanta (+1.7%) and SAIL (+1.5%) gained the most from this sector.

Apollo Hospital (-3.6%) saw profit booking after it hit the resistance at 4900.

Tata Motors (-1.5%) posted a 2.6% YoY growth during  Nov in UK JLR sales. But during this period UK new car registrations rose 23.5% (YoY).

Angel One (-4.7%) saw profit booking after posting Nov monthly business data.

Bajaj Hindusthan hit 20% Upper Circuit for the second consecutive day after it paid the entire loan overdue.

Ion Exchange (+4%) secured Rs 343 crore order from Indian Oil Corporation.

M&M Fin (+5.3%) hit a 52-week high after it posted a loan disbursement of approximately Rs 4,500 crores in November, a 75% YoY jump.

Aditya Birla Capital (+4.5%), Manappuram (+3.6%) and IBul Housing (+2.6%) also moved up.

Fluoro Chem (-5.8%) fell after multiple block trades.

NDTV (-4.3%) closed in the red as Adani Group's open offer closed today. 

Persistent Systems (-1.8%) ended in the red as JPMorgan downgraded the stock to neutral,  just two months after upgrading it to an overweight.

Markets Ahead

A confusing close!

Nifty and Bank Nifty have already hit all-time highs. Today Nifty Midcap index broke the recent 32,200 resistance and is testing its 52-week high. The index should be watched because profit booking in midcap might trigger a market-wide fall. 

For the last many days, buying kicked in whenever Bank Nifty falls below 43k and everyone knows that. I expect that we might see a strong fall if the buying zone below 43k is broken clearly.

In Fin Nifty 19,330 and 160 levels could be watched.

Despite better-than-expected US job data, U.S. benchmark indices closed flat last Friday.

RBI interest rate decision will be out on Wednesday at 10 AM. Also, keep an eye on updates from the Gujarat election.

India PMI Services came out at 56.4 vs 55.1 previously.

India's PMI Composite came out at 56.7 vs 55.5 previously.

Gujarat election results are expected this Thursday. How would it affect the market (considering all the probabilities)? Share your analysis in the comment section below.