Like a slot machine paying off on every pull, the stock market’s most reliable bets lately have often been its riskiest. Go long a company that sounds like something Elon Musk mentioned in a tweet (but wasn’t)? Signal Advance just soared 12-fold. Lend money to a software maker to buy Bitcoin? A Microstrategy convertible bond is up 50 per cent in four weeks (its option is in the money). Throw a dart, hit a winner, so it has lately seemed. Emboldened by Federal Reserve stimulus, vaccines and the psychological conditioning that arises when no bad patch lasts, everyone from retail newbies to institutional managers is rushing to cash in on the 10-month-old meltup. Predicting exactly when such fevers will break is a near impossible task. But bubble warnings are starting to blare from every corner.
In the cash market, the Nifty 50 index surged 209.90 points or 1.48% to 14,347.25.
Turnover on the National Stock Exchange s futures & options (F&O) segment was Rs 17.72 lakh crore compared with Rs 60.51 lakh crore in the previous session.
The NSE s India VIX, a gauge of market s expectation of volatility over the near term, rose 0.97% to 20.815.
The Nifty option chain for 28 January 2020 expiry showed maximum call OI of 18.65 lakh contracts at the 14,000 strike price. Maximum put OI of 25.55 lakh contracts was seen at 13,000 strike price.
Infosys, RIL and TCS were the top traded stock futures contracts in F&O segment for January expiry.
The January 2020 F&O contracts will expire on 28 January 2020.