ET NEWS

Mumbai: As stock exchanges shift to new expiry days for their derivative contracts this week, traders are bracing for a shake-up in the market patterns that they have been accustomed to for years.The National Stock Exchange's weekly and monthly derivatives contracts will now expire on Tuesdays, replacing long-followed Thursday expiries. Instead, Bombay Stock Exchange's contracts will expire on Thursdays from this month."This change will shift the rhythm of the weekly derivatives market," said Puneet Sharma, CEO and fund manager at Whitespace Alpha.123644355"With NSE's weekly expiry moving to Tuesday, we'll see more activity and sharper moves earlier in the week, especially on Mondays and Tuesdays. Essentially, what used to be the 'Thursday rush' now moves forward in the week, and that will become the new normal."Since Nifty derivatives are more widely traded than Sensex contracts, NSE's earlier expiry day of Thursday had seen heavier volumes accompanied by sharp swings. The expiry shifts by the exchanges follow Securities and Exchange Board's diktat to bourses to restrict the expiry days to either of the two days: Tuesday or Thursday. This is after exchanges kept separate expiry days for each contract, which resulted in heightened volatility in the market, forcing the regulator to step in.

Mumbai: India's equity benchmark bounced back on Monday after three sessions of losses as better-than-expected GDP data triggered a rebound in an oversold market. Analysts said, however, that the overhang from US tariffs, currency weakness, and subdued earnings expectations could keep gains under check.The NSE Nifty finished at 24,625, up 0.8%, or 198 points. The BSE Sensex closed at 80,364, 0.7%, or 554 points higher. Both indices fell around 1.5% in August.The Volatility Index (VIX) - the market's fear gauge - dropped 3.9% to 11.29 on Monday, in line with the market rebound."Benchmark Nifty fell a lot in the last three trading sessions, which led to a technical bounce in oversold markets," said Rohit Srivastava, founder, indiacharts.com. "In the near term, there is a downward risk towards 23,800 levels since the earnings growth is expected to be muted, despite the GDP numbers."123644317The broader market ended stronger than the blue chips with the Nifty Mid-cap 150 and the Small-cap 250 indices advancing 1.7% and 1.4%, respectively, on Monday. Out of the 4,380 shares traded on BSE, 2,705 advanced, while 1,495 declined.In the past week, the mid-cap and small-cap indices dropped 1.5% and 1.9%, respectively.All sectoral indices closed higher except the media and pharma indices. Nifty Auto and consumer durables indices gained 2.8% and 2.1%, respectively. Nifty Metals and IT indices rose 1.6% each, while the oil & gas index advanced 1.4%.Srivastava said the tariff threat from the US led to weakness in the rupee, which is a macroeconomic risk that could keep a lid on the gains. FPIs sold shares worth a net ₹1,430 crore on Monday. Their domestic counterparts bought shares worth ₹4,345 crore.. In August, global investors dumped shares worth ₹41,908 crore.

Mumbai | Kolkata: Several clothing retailers from Marks & Spencer and H&M to Zudio and Lifestyle are facing short supplies in their stores nearly three months after India banned road imports of readymade garments from Bangladesh, industry executives said.Readymade garments from the neighbouring country are now allowed only through seaports of Kolkata and Nhava Sheva in Mumbai. While the policy change has led to delays of 2-3 weeks in merchandise sourcing, especially in lower-priced fashion, the impact is felt now as retailers start stocking fresh collections alongside end-of-season sales."The shortfall is more visible now," a senior executive at a global apparel brand said on condition of anonymity.Bangladesh, the world's second-largest exporter of garments after China, is a crucial supplier for Indian brands, especially in the affordable segment.The Directorate General of Foreign Trade (DGFT), in a directive issued on May 17, prohibited imports of all kinds of readymade garments from Bangladesh through land ports.Most retailers including Lifestyle, Reliance and Aditya Birla have been gradually shifting some of their production domestically after the policy shift."While we have shifted some of our sourcing within the country, there are a few categories which we import from Bangladesh and have been delayed due to the policy change," said Devarajan Iyer, chief executive officer of Lifestyle International, India's biggest departmental chain. "We will have to plan ahead to ensure steady supplies of fresh merchandise to minimise its impact on sales."Rahul Mehta, chief mentor of Clothing Manufacturers Association of India (CMAI) and managing director of garment sourcing firm Creative Garments, warned that while cost will increase by 3-5% due to higher shipping costs, the impact will not be immediate as many Indian buyers had secured contracts few months in advance."However, smaller traders and grey market operators, who depend heavily on quick and low-cost supplies from Bangladesh, are expected to get impacted due to the policy shift," Mehta said.The move has led to significant delays in inventory replenishment, especially in the affordable fashion segment."Imports of readymade garments from Bangladesh have dwindled by 25% year-on-year," said Sanjay Jain, managing director of textile and apparel firm TT Industries and chairman of the textile expert panel of the Indian Chamber of Commerce. "These are garments which are priced lower than ₹1,000 and are sold by local retailers and brands."India imported apparels worth $254.44 million from Bangladesh during January-June 2025, up 3.5% from $245.84 million a year earlier, according to data from International Trade Centre (ITC) and Confederation of Indian Textile Industry (CITI).

The Quad, a strategic security dialogue between the United States, India, Japan, and Australia, once hailed as a bold geopolitical response to China’s growing influence in the Indo-Pacific, is now showing signs of strain. Originally envisioned as a bulwark of democratic cooperation, the initiative’s cohesion is now under pressure from within, notably from the very country that resuscitated it in 2017 under then-President Donald Trump.Trump’s decision to cancel his planned participation in the upcoming Quad summit in India , reportedly due to worsening personal and diplomatic ties with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, is the latest and most visible signal of the grouping’s internal rift. According to a report by The New York Times, Trump’s move follows a diplomatic fallout with Modi, despite the Indian leader extending a formal invitation after the G7 summit. The optics and comments from Modi's visit to SCO Summit at Tianjin in China suggest India is shifting away from the US and towards China. Even Japan and Australia seem to be revising their stance. The Quad was born out of humanitarian collaboration in the aftermath of the 2004 Indian Ocean tsunami, when the four nations came together to coordinate disaster relief. It re-emerged in 2017, amid rising concerns about China’s expanding economic and military footprint in the region. Trump, then in his first term, strongly advocated for the Quad’s revival, positioning it as a core element of his administration’s Indo-Pacific strategy.However, during his second term, Trump’s increasingly transactional and unpredictable foreign policy has begun to unravel the delicate diplomatic balance within the grouping. His combative economic stance, unilateral trade measures and arm-twisting tactics have introduced new tensions, not just with adversaries but also with long-standing allies.Also Read | PM Modi sends Trump a message, Pakistan a warning, China a reminderThe reluctant partnersIndia’s importance to the Quad cannot be overstated. As the only member sharing a land border with China, India serves as the grouping’s strategic anchor in the region. Yet India’s approach to China has evolved. Prime Minister Modi’s participation in the SCO Summit in Tianjin, where he held a bilateral meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping, signals India’s desire to recalibrate ties with Beijing despite ongoing border tensions.Modi’s outreach to China contrasts with the coolness in US-India ties. Trump’s erratic diplomacy and disregard for institutional consensus have alienated key leaders, including Modi, who had once found ideological common ground with Trump’s assertive posturing. The cancellation of Trump’s India visit underscores how personal and policy-level disconnects are now feeding into broader geopolitical recalibrations.Australia, too, finds itself in a difficult position. Once a vocal supporter of the Quad and of Trump’s Indo-Pacific strategy, Australia is now grappling with the economic fallout of Trump’s protectionist agenda. The imposition of a 10% tariff on Australian exports, despite a longstanding free trade agreement, and a universal 50% tariff on steel and aluminium have hit the Australian economy. More recently, Trump’s threat to impose a 250% tariff on pharmaceuticals has further escalated tensions.Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s July visit to Beijing was more than a symbolic reset; it was a calculated move to strengthen economic ties with China, Australia’s largest trading partner, while maintaining a cautious eye on strategic competition. The fact that Trump has not found time to meet with Albanese since he has been sworn in is a clear indication of the cooling diplomatic ties.Australian Foreign Minister Penny Wong, speaking ahead of Modi’s recent trip to Japan and China, criticised Trump’s tariff policies in a thinly veiled rebuke. While she avoided direct commentary on US-India relations, she made it clear that Australia does not support tariffs and believes in openness as a path to economic growth, a subtle but clear divergence from Trump’s America First rhetoric.Even Japan, often the most aligned with the US in strategic forums, now seems to be recalculating its position. Although it has reached a trade agreement with the US, Tokyo has been vocal about its concerns over Washington’s strong-arm tactics. The cancellation of Japanese trade negotiator Ryosei Akazawa’s visit to the US just before Modi’s trip to Japan underscores the friction. The visit was meant to finalise the proposed $550 billion Japanese investment package in the US, potentially easing the impact of Trump’s tariffs. Instead, its abrupt postponement revealed Japan’s unease with Trump’s approach.At the same time, Tokyo has started engaging more openly with China. Recent signs of a thaw include resumed trade, relaxed travel restrictions and bilateral dialogues. While mutual mistrust on strategic issues persists, Japan is willing to hedge its bet when the US has turned transactional.Also Read | Putin adopts limo diplomacy in China jaunt with PM ModiQuad drifting without direction?The Quad was always more of a strategic alignment than a formal alliance. Its informal, non-binding nature allowed for flexibility but also made it vulnerable to shifts in national priorities and leadership styles. Trump’s first term had provided the political impetus to revive the Quad as a geopolitical counterweight to China. But his second term is now characterized by erratic leadership, inward-looking policies and a tendency to alienate even close allies.With all three of America’s Quad partners increasingly uneasy, and all of them independently engaging with China, the grouping appears to be adrift. The absence of Trump from the upcoming summit, coupled with rising intra-group tensions, suggests that the Quad’s future may be less about confronting China and more about managing the fallout from US unpredictability.As India, Japan and Australia hedge their bets, the fundamental premise of the Quad, strategic unity in the face of Chinese assertiveness, is being quietly but steadily undermined. In the end, it may be Trump's own policies, not Chinese diplomacy, that do the most damage to his once bright anti-China idea.

Auto stocks rallied as much as 6% on Monday ahead of the all important two-day GST council meeting that starts on Wednesday, September 3. Sectorally, auto trumped its peers with the Nifty Auto index finishing the day with 2.8% uptick. All the 15 stocks settled in the green. The positive sentiments helped stocks sail through despite lackluster August auto sales numbers in many of the major passenger vehicle makers. Tube Investment of India was the top gainer in the pack, rising 6.4% today and was followed by Exide Industries and Samvardhana Motherson International which were up 4%, each.Two-wheeler major Bajaj Auto shares surged 4% to finish the session at Rs 346.50. The company posted a 5% YoY growth in sales in the reported month at 4,17,616 units versus 3,97,804 units in the year ago period.Meanwhile, Mahindra & Mahindra (M&M) shares rallied 3.5% despite reporting a 1% YoY decline in total sales at 75,901 units in August. Likewise, Tata Motors shares rose over 3% to end at Rs 689.70 despite the company reporting a 2% year-on-year drop in domestic sales numbers at 68,482 units. On a month-on-month basis total passenger vehicles (PVs) witnessed a 3% drop to 43,315 units in August 2025.India's largest passenger car maker Maruti Suzuki settled with an uptick of 0.5%. The company sold 180,683 units in August 2025 versus, down from 181,782 units in the year ago period.Other Nifty Auto constituents viz. Hero MotoCorp, Eicher Motors, MRF, TVS Motor Company, Bosch, Balkrishna Industries, Bharat Forge and Ashok Leyland saw their share prices increase between 3% and 0.8%.Royal Enfield maker Eicher Motors saw a stellar sales uptick of 55% in August 2025 at 1,14,002 units versus 73,629 units in the year ago period. TVS also reported a monthly sales of 509,536 units in August 2025 with a growth of 30% as against 391,588 units in the month of August 2024. The high-powered GST Council meeting chaired by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on September 3-4 will be keenly watched by the Street. Any development on the two-slab taxation regime could act as a market trigger. The trend has been visible in auto and consumption stocks that are being seen as top beneficiaries of the reform. These sectors were top performers in August which was otherwise a lackluster month for market participants.Nifty Auto has been the best performing sector in August with index returns of 10% in the past one month.(Disclaimer: Recommendations, suggestions, views and opinions given by the experts are their own. These do not represent the views of Economic Times)