10 things you need to know before the opening bell on October 21
1. Asia: Stocks in Asia-Pacific rose in Wednesday morning trade as investors continue to watch for developments on U.S. coronavirus stimulus. In Japan, the Nikkei 225 added 0.36 percent in early trade while the Topix index gained 0.94 percent. South Korea’s Kospi rose 0.35 percent. Meanwhile, shares in Australia edged higher, with the S&P/ASX 200 up 0.19 percent. MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan traded 0.11 percent higher, reported CNBC International. (Image: Reuters)2. US: U.S. stock index futures rose in overnight trading on Tuesday after White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows said that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin have made “good progress” on stimulus talks, before adding that they “still have a ways to go” before an agreement is reached. Futures contracts tied to the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 124 points, indicating a more than 100-point rally at the open on Wednesday. S&P 500 futures traded 0.5 percent higher, while Nasdaq 100 futures advanced 0.6 percent, reported CNBC International. (Image: Reuters)3. Closing Bell: Indian indices ended higher on Tuesday mainly led by IT stocks and some financials after the banking index turned positive. Heavyweights HDFC Bank, Infosys, HCL Tech, TCS, and Asian Paints contributed the most to the benchmarks in today’s trade. The Sensex ended 113 points higher at 40,544 while the Nifty rose 24 points to settle at 11,897. Broader markets outperformed benchmarks with Nifty Midcap and Nifty Smallcap rising 0.6 percent and 0.4 percent, respectively. Among sectors, Nifty Realty surged over 4 percent and Nifty IT added 1.4 percent. Nifty Bank, Nifty Auto and Nifty Pharma also ended the day in the green. (Image: Reuters)4. Crude Oil: Oil edged up on Tuesday on hopes that the United States was nearing a stimulus deal, but the threat to demand from rising coronavirus cases worldwide and increased Libyan output kept prices from moving higher. Brent crude futures gained 20 cents to $42.82 a barrel. November U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude futures settled 63 cents, or 1.54 percent, higher at $41.46 per barrel, reported CNBC International. (Image: Reuters)5. Rupee Close: The Indian currency depreciated 12 paise to close at 73.49 against the US currency due to the dollar buying by state-run banks amid increased forex inflows. Capital inflows and strong domestic equities, however, limited the local currency’s losses, said PTI. (Image: Reuters)6. India Considering To Remove Plasma Therapy From Guidelines: In what could leave a huge gap in COVID-19 investigational therapies, the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR) and the national task force is considering to delete convalescent plasma therapy from its national COVID-19 treatment protocol guidelines. The decision, if taken, will be based on clinical trials conducted by ICMR that showed plasma therapy did not reduce COVID-19 mortality or disease progression. Convalescent plasma therapy at present is listed as “off-label” use and as an investigational therapy in national guidelines. In a press briefing, Director General of ICMR Dr Balram Bhargava said, “We have done a large clinical trial on plasma, it will be published in the British Journal. Discussing within the task force on may be deleting plasma therapy from our national covid19 treatment guidelines.” (Image: PTI)7. Delays In Customs Clearance Cripple Import-Export Industry: Customs clearance delays continue to cripple the Indian industry as they have extended from the earlier 15-20 days to 25-30 days, and in some cases clearance is being given after over a month, sources told CNBC-TV18. The industry and custom brokers are citing the poor rollout of faceless assessment for the delays. The sectors that are being impacted by the delay has expanded. Earlier, delays were faced primarily by automobiles, auto ancillary, electrical machinery, metals, chemicals and medical equipment. However, now labour intensive sectors and domestic manufacturing are also getting impacted, due to the delay in release of goods. According to export agencies, the delay is worsening the situation as the current period is peak business time ahead of the Christmas break. Export agencies have claimed that there are no containers available and freight rates have shot up substantially. They believe that there is an urgent need for regulatory body to regulate the operations. (Image: Reuters)8. Sales Of Manufacturing Companies Contracted: Aggregate sales of private sector manufacturing companies recorded a sharp contraction of 41.1 percent year-on-year in the first quarter of 2020-21, reflecting the impact of the pandemic induced lockdown, said an RBI analysis on Tuesday. The data on the performance of the private corporate sector during the first quarter of 2020-21 has been drawn from abridged quarterly financial results of 2,5361 listed non-government non-financial (NGNF) companies, the RBI said. “Aggregate sales of 1,619 manufacturing companies recorded a sharp contraction of 41.1 percent (Y-o-Y) in Q1:2020-21 following 15.6 percent decline in Q4:2019-20 reflecting the impact of the pandemic induced lockdown,” it said. (Image: Reuters)9. WEF On Recession And Automation: The Future of Jobs 2020 report has found that COVID-19 has caused the labour market to change faster than expected. The research released today by the World Economic Forum indicates that what used to be considered the “future of work” has already arrived. By 2025, automation and a new division of labour between humans and machines will disrupt 85 million jobs globally in medium and large businesses across 15 industries and 26 economies. Roles in areas such as data entry, accounting and administrative support are decreasing in demand as automation and digitization in the workplace increases. More than 80% of business executives are accelerating plans to digitize work processes and deploy new technologies; and 50% of employers are expecting to accelerate the automation of some roles in their companies. In contrast to previous years, job creation is now slowing while job destruction is accelerating. (Image: Reuters)10. Siemens Healthineers To Make COVID Testing Kits: German medical tech company Siemens Healthineers is in the process of expanding its manufacturing capacity in India to locally produce testing kits for diagnosing COVID-19. The company has also applied for a licence for its newly launched rapid antigen test kit with the ICMR and is awaiting approval, Vivek Kanade, executive vice president for Siemens Healthineers In India, told CNBC TV 18. “We are expanding our manufacturing plant in Baroda to locally manufacture testing kits. Currently, all of these are being imported from our factories in Europe and US,” Kanade said. The plant is currently manufacturing reagents and entry-level blood analysers. (Image: Reuters)
