Mumbai, Jan 31: As the nation gears up for the Economic Survey and the Union Budget 2025-26, the domestic benchmark indices on Friday opened higher. Optimism was seen in the air as investors looked for potential catalysts in the upcoming Budget.

While the Sensex was up almost 184 points or 0.24 per cent at 76,935 around 9.31 a.m., the Nifty gained 74 points or 0.32 per cent at 23,323 in early trade.

Sensex and Nifty have been on a three-day winning streak this week despite foreign institutional investors (FIIs) unwinding long positions.

Larsen & Toubro, Infosys, Titan, Tata Consumer Products and Maruti Suzuki India added to the Nifty 50 index, while Bharti Airtel, ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank, NTPC and Coal India weighed on the Nifty 50 index.

On the NSE, six sectors advanced and six declined out of 12. The NSE Nifty Metal declined the most, and the NSE Nifty IT advanced the most.

The BSE Midcap and Smallcap indices were trading 0.31 per cent or 0.295 higher, respectively.

According to market watchers, some volatility is expected amid the Union Budget announcements, and key sectors to watch out for include railways, infrastructure, fertilisers, textiles and electric vehicles (EV), etc.

Akshay Chinchalkar, Head of Research, Axis Securities, said that Nifty had a volatile outing on Thursday as a slump post noon saw a recovery in the final hour of trading.

“What's notable is that the December close was 23,644, so if we aren't able to close above this level today, it will be the first time since September 2001 that the Nifty would have fallen for four successive months,” he mentioned.

The FIIs remained net sellers on January 30, as they sold equities worth Rs 4,582.95 crore, while domestic institutional investors purchased equities worth Rs 2,165.89 crore on the same day.

Given the prevailing volatility, traders are advised to exercise caution, implement strict stop-loss strategies, and avoid carrying positions overnight while maintaining strict stop-losses, as high volatility is expected ahead of the Union Budget 2025, said Hardik Matalia of Choice Broking.

The Economic Survey is prepared under the supervision of the Chief Economic Advisor V. Anantha Nageswaran, and includes insights into the economy prepared by the economic division of the Department of Economic Affairs in the Ministry of Finance.

The Union Budget will be presented by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on February 1.

—IANS

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