Sensex drops over 250 points in early trade; Nifty below 18,650

“The better-than-expected US job numbers in November were surprisingly ignored by the market with the S&P 500 ending flat. This message from the market indicates that the Fed is unlikely to reverse its well telegraphed slower pace of tightening,” V K Vijayakumar, Chief Investment Strategist at

said.

“The market doesn’t see the terminal rate going above 5%. In India there are signals that this is a market trending higher, in spite of the high valuations. The upcoming MPC decision and more importantly the RBI’s message will be keenly awaited by the market. The mid and small cap rally is likely to gather momentum,” Vijayakumar added.

Among Sensex stocks,

, ITC, , , , SBI and were the top gainers, rising around up to 1%. L&T, , , and also opened higher. However, HUL, HDFC, TCS, , , , and opened with the cuts.

Sectorally, the Nifty Metal rose 0.85% while Nifty Realty surged 0.73%. While Nifty FMCG and Nifty IT opened lower. Whereas, in the broader market, Nifty Midcap50 surged 0.12% and Smallcap50 increased 0.39%.

US stocks ended mostly lower Friday on signs that the US labor market remained robust in November despite the Federal Reserve’s interest-rate hikes. On Friday, Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.10% while S&P 500 plunged 0.12% and Nasdaq Composite declined 0.18%.

In early trade in Asian markets, Japan’s Nikkei 225 dropped 0.08% and South Korea’s Kospi fell 0.52% while China’s Shanghai Composite advanced 1.56%.

The Indian rupee increased 0.02% to 81.33 against the US dollar in early trade on Monday. Meanwhile, the dollar index, which tracks the movement of the greenback against a basket of six major world currencies, decreased 0.38% to 104.14 level.

Brent crude February futures increased 1.05% to $86.47 a barrel, while U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude futures surged 1.10% to $80.84 a barrel.