Indian equity benchmarks ended a volatile session on Wednesday more than one percent off their intraday highs. Strength in oil & gas and metal shares was outweighed by weakness in financial, IT and auto scrips.

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Globally, the mood turned sour, with Asian and European equities making a U-Turn from multi-week highs as investors braced for higher interest rates and tracked updates on the Ukraine crisis.

What do the charts suggest for Dalal Street now?

The Nifty50 appears to be sticking to a higher bottom formation on the intraday as well as daily charts but t is consistently facing resistance near 17,440, according to Shrikant Chouhan, Head of Equity Research (Retail) at Kotak Securities.

Support for the 50-scrip index has shifted to 17,200 from 17,000, he said.

A make-or-break level

Market participants will look out for the index weathering overbought technical conditions on the daily charts, hawkish tunes from the Fed and the spike in crude oil rates, said Prashanth Tapse, Vice President (Research) at Mehta Equities.

He is of the view that the make-or-break support level for the Nifty lies at its 200-day moving average (17,021.5), below which, a waterfall of selling can be expected.

Here are key things to know about the market before the March 24 session:

SGX Nifty

At 7:31 am on Thursday, Singapore Exchange (SGX) Nifty futures -- an early indicator of the Nifty50 index -- were down 46 points or 0.3 percent at 17,210. Investors globally tracked updates on the Russia-Ukraine war, crude oil rates and COVID cases in China.

Global markets

Equities in other Asian markets on Thursday retreated from three-month highs clocked in the previous session, tracking overnight losses on Wall Street. MSCI's broadest index of Asia Pacific shares outside Japan was down 0.7 percent in early hours. Japan's Nikkei 225 was down 1.1 percent, China's Shanghai Composite 0.8 percent, Hong Kong's Hang Seng 0.9 percent and South Korea's KOSPI 0.8 percent.

S&P 500 futures were up 0.1 percent. On Wednesday, the S&P 500 dropped 1.2 percent, and the Dow as well as the Nasdaq Composite 1.3 percent each, cooling off from higher levels seen this week.

What to expect on Dalal Street

Kotak Securities' Chouhan expects the Nifty50 to reach levels of 17,350-17,440 if it keeps above 17,200, but fears that a dismissal of 17,180 may extend weakness till the 17,100-17,040 band.

Independent technical analyst believes the Nifty is in a strong uptrend and poised to remain so till March-end, with momentum indicators MACD and RSI giving positive signals.

He feels the Nifty has the potential to reach 17,600-17,900 levels and sees a buy-on-dips opportunity as long as it holds the 16,800-16,900 support range.

Levels to watch out for

Mohit Nigam, Head-PMS at Hem Securities, pointed out the following levels:

FII/DII activity

Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) net bought Indian shares worth Rs 481.3 crore on Wednesday, according to provisional exchange data. However, domestic institutional investors (DIIs) net sold equities worth Rs 294.2 crore. That was in contrast to the trend of FII outflows and DII inflows in the past six months.

Call/put open interest

The maximum call open interest is accumulated at the 18,000 and 17,500 strike prices, with around 1.7 lakh contracts each, and the maximum put open interest at 16,500, with more than 84,000 contracts, according to exchange data.

This suggests the index has immediate resistance at 17,500 followed by the major hurdle of 18,000, and support at 16,500.

Long build-up

Here are five stocks that saw an increase in open interest as well as price:

Long unwinding

(Decrease in open interest as well as price)

Short-covering

(Increase in price and decrease in open interest)

Short build-up

(Increase in open interest and decrease in price)

52-week highs

A total of 12 stocks on the BSE 500 hit 52-week highs: Cummins

CENTURYPLY

CHALET

CHOLAFIN

CUMMINSIND

DELTACORP

GHCL

JINDALSTEL

LINDEINDIA

RATNAMANI

RHIM

SUVENPHAR

TRENT

52-week lows

Only one stock hit a 52-week low: Procter & Gamble Health.

Fear gauge

The India VIX -- also known as the fear index -- rose 2.8 percent to settle at 24.8 near its intraday day on Wednesday. Last month, Russia's move to invade Ukraine had pushed the gauge to a 20-month high.

First Published:Mar 23, 2022 7:18 PM IST