Asian shares crept cautiously higher on Monday, while the dollar and bond yields were on the wane ahead of inflation data that investors hope will pave the way for rate cuts in the United States and Europe.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan added 0.4%, after rising 1.1% last week, while South Korea rose 0.3%.

US stocks rose Friday after Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell indicated interest rate cuts were on the horizon.

Here's a table showing how US stocks performed on Friday:

Source: Equitymaster

At present, the BSE Sensex is trading 329 points higher and NSE Nifty is trading 91 points higher.

ONGC, Wipro, and TCS are among the top gainers today.

ITC, Grasim Industries, and Apollo Hospital the other hand are among the top losers today.

Broader markets are trading on positive. The BSE Midcap index is trading 0.4% higher and the BSE Smallcap index is trading 0.5% higher.

Barring the FMCG sector, all other sectoral indices are trading positive today, with stocks in the metal sector and banking sector witnessing buying.

The rupee is trading at Rs 83.82 against the US dollar.

In commodity markets, gold prices are trading flat at Rs 71,76 per 10 grams today.
 

ONGC Opens Well in KG Field

State-owned Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) said on Sunday that it opened another well on its flagship deep-sea project in the Krishna Godavari basin in the Bay of Bengal, which will help augment the production of crude oil and natural gas.

In January this year, ONGC started producing oil, which is converted into fuels like petrol and diesel in refineries, from the KG-DWN-98/2 or KG-D5 block.

However, it did not state how much the new well was producing.

With this, ONGC also successfully commissioned its gas export line from the offshore-to-onshore terminal.

The block, which sits next to Reliance Industries' KG-D6 block in the KG basin, has several discoveries that have been clubbed into clusters.

Located 35 kilometers off the coast of Andhra Pradesh in water depths ranging from 300-3,200 meters, the discoveries in the block are divided into Cluster-1, 2, and 3. Cluster 2 is being put into production first.

As per original plans, oil production from Cluster-2 should have begun by November 2021 but was delayed because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Thereafter, ONGC set May 2023 as the first Cluster-2 oil production deadline but then extended it to August 2023 and after that extended the flow of first oil every month, with the last deadline announced being December 2023. Oil started flowing on January 7, 2024.

Alembic Pharma Receives USFDA Approval

Alembic Pharmaceuticals announced that it has received final approval from the US Food & Drug Administration (USFDA) for its Abbreviated New Drug Application (ANDA) Betamethasone Valerate Foam.

The approved ANDA is therapeutically equivalent to the reference listed drug product (RLD), Luxiq Foam of Norvium Bioscience, LLC (Norvium).

Betamethasone valerate foam is a medium potency topical corticosteroid indicated for relief of the inflammatory and pruritic manifestations of corticosteroid-responsive dermatoses of the scalp.

The company has a cumulative total of 213 ANDA approvals (185 final approvals and 28 tentative approvals) from USFDA.

Alembic Pharmaceuticals is in the business of development, manufacturing, and marketing of pharmaceutical products i.e. Formulations and Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients.
 

Infosys Eyes Acquisitions

Infosys Ltd. is looking to acquire more companies operating in data analytics and software-as-a-service (SaaS), as generative artificial intelligence (AI) is fuelling clients' strong interest.

The IT giant head also said that he does not foresee any layoff in the company on this new-age technology's (AI) account, reported the news agency. The company may look at some areas within Europe or the United States.

The news agency asked about more acquisitions that could be of scale matching in the tech industry, which came with a price tag of 450 million euros.

In January 2024, Infosys announced a definitive agreement to acquire 100 percent of InSemi Technology Services, an Indian chip-designing company for nearly Rs 2.8 bn.

Infosys, in April 2024, acquired a 100 percent stake in in-Tech Holding for nearly 450 million euros. The company deals with providing engineering R&D services and is headquartered in Germany.

Parekh also highlighted that it is tough to put a timeline on the ongoing deal discussions when asked about closing the year with more acquisitions.

Infosys disclosed earlier this year that the company is working on 225 Generative AI client programs and more than 2.5 lakh employees are being trained in generative AI.

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