Indices End Higher On Hopes Of A Rollback Of Surcharge

Markets were on a roller-coaster ride in trade today, with the index plunging as much as 350 points in early morning trade, following the imposition of trade tariffs by the US President Donald Trump.

However, they staged a remarkable recovery in later afternoon trading. One of the prime reasons for the recovery was reports in ET Now that the Prime Minister's Office (PMO) and finance ministry's top bureaucrats on Thursday held discussions over the suggestions and submissions by foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) regarding the surcharge issue. According to reports there maybe a tweak to the surcharge on the super rich, which tends to impact FPIs treated as trusts.

The Sensex ended the day higher by 100 points, while the Nifty gained 17 points, in what was an extremely volatile week.

The recovery was led by a surge in the shares of heavyweight, HDFC, which has consistently lost ground in the last few days.

Bharti Airtel was the top gainer in trade, with stock surging a huge 5 per cent, despite the company reporting a poor set of results.

Auto stocks, which had been battered out of shape, saw a sharp recovery with Mahindra and Mahindra and Bajaj Auto leading the rally.

Analysts believe that todays gains maybe short lived, as this was a technical bounce, which was long overdue.

Stocks that lost ground despite the spectacular rally were names like Coal India and ONGC.

Meanwhile, European markets were trading deeply in the red, following the imposition of trade tariffs by US President Donald Trump.

The German DAX was down 2.41 per cent, while the French CAC fell as much as 2.75 per cent. Dow Futures too pointed to lower openings.