Sensex, Nifty May Follow Global Peers Lower Ahead Of Powell's Testimony

(RTTNews) - Indian shares may open lower on Wednesday, with tech stocks likely to suffer heavy losses amid considerable uncertainty about the outlook for U.S. interest rates.

Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell is due to testify before the House Financial Services Committee later today and the Senate Banking Committee on Thursday, with analysts expecting the Fed chief to reiterate the lack of urgency to cut rates.

Benchmark indexes Sensex and Nifty ended slightly lower on Tuesday after hitting new record highs for three consecutive sessions. The rupee ended little changed at 82.89 against the dollar.

Bloomberg Index Services announced that Indian FAR (Fully Accessible Route) bonds would be included in the Bloomberg EM Local Currency Government indices with an initial weight of 10 percent of their full market value on January 31, 2025.

Asian stocks were seeing modest losses this morning while the dollar held steady as investors brace for the ECB rate decision and Powell's congressional testimony.

Gold traded near record highs while oil extended losses for a third straight session on concerns about demand growth in China, the world's biggest crude importer.

U.S. stocks fell sharply overnight to extend losses from the previous session, as investors digested weak economic readings and looked ahead to Fed Chair Jerome Powell's testimony for directional cues.

U.S. services industry growth slowed a bit in February and new orders for manufactured goods dropped more than expected in January, raising concerns about the state of the world's largest economy.

The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite plunged 1.7 percent to suffer its worst single-day loss in three weeks, while the S&P 500 and the Dow both lost about 1 percent each.

European stocks closed lower on Tuesday as China jitters offset encouraging business activity data showing signs of recovery in the euro zone last month.

The pan European STOXX 600 gave up 0.2 percent. The German DAX slipped 0.1 percent and France's CAC 40 shed 0.3 percent while the U.K.'s FTSE 100 finished marginally higher.