Metal stocks jump up to 11%; Hindustan Copper, Vedanta & others hit 52-week highs

Hindustan Copper soared 11% to hit its 52-week high of Rs 366.40 on the NSE. The stock traded amid significant volumes with over 4.80 crore shares changing hands on the NSE around 1:30 pm.

The company last week reported MIC (Metal in concentrate) production of 27,404 tonnes for FY 2023-24, the highest in the last five years and 11% higher than last year. The company achieved ore production of 3.78 million tonnes in FY 2023-24, the highest in the last four years and 13% over last year, the company said in a filing on April 2. Since then, the stock has seen an unbroken run and rallied for five sessions in a row.

Hindustan Zinc also jumped by 11% to hit a fresh 52-week high of Rs 381. The Vedanta subsidiary has remained unbeaten over the last seven trading sessions. The company reported solid Q4 updates with best-ever mined metal production at 1,079 kt, up 2% YoY, driven by improved mined metal grades. Refined metal also achieved its highest annual production.

Meanwhile, Vedanta delivered its highest-ever annual volume across key businesses for the reported quarter. The stock also hit its 52-week high of Rs 337.85, gaining 4.5% on the intraday basis.

The gains catapulted the to its 52-week high of 8,985, with 12 stocks trading in the green. The laggards were , and which fell up to 3%.

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The other gainers in the index were , (), , , Jindal Steel & Power, , and Ratnamani Metals & Tubes which gained up to 3%.

Not just the local factors, the metal stocks have taken cues from improving outlook and appreciation in metal prices in international markets. Last week, data showed US manufacturing growing for the first time in one-and-a-half years meanwhile China's manufacturing activity also expanded for the first time in six months in March.

"I think if you look at the overall market rally in the last one year, it has been very sector-specific. Now, in the last year, we saw that infrastructure and the realty sector did very well and now the sector rotation is happening and we have seen that metals have taken the lead. So, I think we should go with momentum trading which is the current flavour of the month or the week in the metal sector and best is Jindal Steel," Vishal Malkan, told ET Now.

Dr V K Vijayakumar, Chief Investment Strategist, Geojit Financial Services also credited the recent rally in headline indices to the performance of select sectors including metal.

"An important feature of the recent rally in India is that it is led by fundamentally strong sectors like capital goods, automobiles, banking and metals," Vijayakumar said.

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