Informist, Saturday, Jan 20, 2024
By Anjana Therese Antony
MUMBAI – Traders placed out-of-the-money bets on call contracts of ICICI Bank, alluding to more upside for the stock. Premiums of strike prices at and above 1,015 rupees of call options rose, while those of put contracts below this level declined. The resistance for the stock is pegged at 1,040 rupees, a technical analyst at a domestic broking firm said. This is over 40 rupees higher than today’s closing price of 1,008.70 rupees.
Post market hours today, the bank released its earnings for the December quarter, where its net profit rose 23.6% on year to 102.72 bln rupees, higher than analysts’ consensus estimate of 99.52 bln rupees. The bank’s gross non-performing assets ratio improved to 2.30% as of Dec 31 from 2.48% a quarter ago. In a post-earnings call, the management said it is comfortable with the bank’s current credit-deposit ratio. It also said the growth in deposits and loans is balanced.
Coming back to call contracts, the premium of 1,040 rupees strike price rose by 1.70 rupees to 9.45 rupees and this level had the highest addition of open interest of over 476,000. Strike price 1,100 rupees had the highest addition of open interest of more than 228,000 and the premium rose 0.2 rupee to nearly 2 rupees.
The put options chain saw a fall in premiums across strike prices below 1,015 rupees. The premium of this level dropped by nearly 10 rupees to 21.70 rupees, while open interest additions rose 33,600. At the 1,010 rupee strike price, the premium declined by 13.20 rupees to 15.35 rupees. The technical analyst said the support for the stock is 990 rupees.
The equity market will remain shut on Monday due to Ram Temple consecration in Ayodhya. Next week, the stock market is likely to gain some strength, but may move in thin range, analysts said. However, earnings are likely to lead to stock-specific reactions.
“Strong put writing (bulls’ entry) with call writers exiting (bears exit) was observed at 21,500 and 21,600 strikes of Nifty (50),” Om Mehra, technical analyst at SAMCO Securities, said in a post-market note. “Strong put writing at a particular strike price is usually considered as a sign of support getting stronger and stronger possibility of price moving higher,” Mehra added.
Today, the Nifty 50 closed nearly 51 points lower at 21571.80 points and the BSE Sensex ended nearly 260 points lower at 71423.65 points. A crucial support for the 50-stock index lies at 21500 points and resistance is pegged at 21800 points.
–Nifty 50 Jan closed at 21620.30, down 51.85 points; 48.50-point premium to spot index
–Nifty 50 Feb closed at 21765.00, down 49.90 points; 193.20-point premium to spot index
–Nifty 50 Mar closed at 21920.00, down 43.35 points; 348.20-point premium to spot index
HDFC Bank, Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corp, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Reliance Industries, State Bank of India, Power Finance Corp, Coal India, ICICI Bank, REC, Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone, and Adani Enterprises were the most actively traded underlying stocks. End
Edited by Deepshikha Bhardwaj
For users of real-time market data terminals, Informist news is available exclusively on the NSE Cogencis WorkStation.
Cogencis news is now Informist news. This follows the acquisition of Cogencis Information Services Ltd by NSE Data & Analytics Ltd, a 100% subsidiary of the National Stock Exchange of India Ltd. As a part of the transaction, the news department of Cogencis has been sold to Informist Media Pvt Ltd.
Informist Media Tel +91 (22) 6985-4000
Send comments to [email protected]
© Informist Media Pvt. Ltd. 2024. All rights reserved.
Source: Cogencis
