India bounces after crash
India’s BSE Sensex closed above 74,500 and the Nifty50 topped 23,100 on March 20 — both up about 0.5% as markets recovered from Thursday’s ~2,500‑point Sensex rout that wiped out roughly Rs 11 lakh crore of investor wealth (timesofindia.indiatimes.com). Global risk gauges remain noisy: US indices staged only a partial rebound while VIX stayed elevated amid oil surges and geopolitics ( ).
Sensex ended the session at 74,532.96 (up 325.72 points) while Nifty50 finished at 23,114.50 (up 112.35 points); both indices pared large intraday gains after a run-up that briefly saw the Sensex surge more than 1,000 points earlier in the day. (economictimes.indiatimes.com) Thursday’s sell‑off erased roughly ₹11.5 lakh crore of BSE market capitalisation after the Sensex plunged about 2,497 points and the Nifty fell approximately 776 points in a single session. (timesofindia.indiatimes.com (zeebiz.com) The immediate trigger was an energy shock: Brent crude spiked above $110–$119 on March 19 after attacks and supply‑route disruption in the Persian Gulf, a move that Reuters and CNBC said stoked fresh inflation and risk‑off flows. (cnbc.com (wsj.com)) Sector action on Friday saw IT, PSU banks and metals lead the bounce, with names such as Tech Mahindra and Tata Steel among intraday outperformers that rose around 3% at peaks, while financials had been the epicenter of Thursday’s weakness. (economictimes.indiatimes.com) Volatility measures spiked: India VIX jumped to about 22.8 (up ~21.8% on March 19), and global risk gauges including the US VIX and major US indices hit 2026 lows before staging partial rebounds, underscoring continued option‑market repricing of tail risk. (livemint.com) Foreign portfolio investors have been persistent sellers through March, pulling roughly ₹89,900 crore over a 15‑session stretch ending March 19, a pattern analysts link to the recent sharp corrections and the oil‑geopolitics shock. (economictimes.indiatimes.com)
