Last Updated:February 04, 2026, 09:25 IST

Indian equities paused on Wednesday after the previous session’s sharp surge triggered by the India–US trade agreement

Stock Market Today.

Sensex Today: Indian equities paused on Wednesday after the previous session’s sharp surge triggered by the India–US trade agreement. The pact, which reduced US tariffs on Indian goods to 18 per cent from 50 per cent, had buoyed sentiment and removed a major overhang, but markets turned cautious as traders booked profits.

A decline in information technology stocks further weighed on the mood.

At the open, the BSE Sensex was around 83,430, down 309 points or 0.37 per cent, while the Nifty 50 stood at 25,663, lower by 65 points or 0.25 per cent.

Broader markets also traded in the red, with the Nifty MidCap index slipping 0.48 per cent and the Nifty SmallCap index easing 0.18 per cent.

The Nifty IT index tumbled more than 5.5 per cent, led by losses in Persistent Systems, LTIMindtree, Infosys, HCL Tech, Coforge, TCS, Mphasis and Tech Mahindra.

Global cues

US markets ended lower overnight as investors rotated out of technology stocks into sectors more closely tied to economic recovery. The Dow Jones slipped 0.34 per cent, the S&P 500 declined 0.84 per cent, and the Nasdaq fell 1.43 per cent at the close.

Asian markets were mixed in early trade on Wednesday amid the absence of strong triggers. China’s CSI 300 index dropped 0.29 per cent, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng edged down 0.05 per cent, and Japan’s Nikkei lost 0.61 per cent. In contrast, South Korea’s Kospi rose 0.54 per cent.

In commodities, spot gold gained over 1 per cent to $5,002 per ounce, while spot silver advanced 0.69 per cent to $85.70 per ounce.

On the macro front, investors await the release of S&P Global/HSBC composite and services PMI final data for January from both India and Japan.

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Younger and entry-level workers are being squeezed the hardest by higher employment costs slowing the rate that firms are hiring, new analysis shows.

Some UK businesses have seen the cost of employing workers rise on the back of recent policy measures, including tax and minimum wage increases and reforms to employment rights, the National Institute of Economic and Social Research (Niesr) said in its latest economic outlook.

These factors have raised the marginal cost of hiring by around 7%, in real terms, for an entry level position, according to its findings.

Niesr warned that sectors most exposed to cost increases were experiencing a bigger impact, pointing to data showing a link between exposure to the national minimum wage and rising unemployment.

This includes typically lower-paid industries such as hotels, hospitality and food chains, which also have a greater concentration of younger and early-career workers.

Its analysis found that, rather than cutting existing jobs, many firms have chosen to slow the rate that they hire staff.

Therefore younger workers and those “at the margins of the labour market” are being disproportionately squeezed, the think tank said.

Official figures at the end of last year showed that the unemployment rate rose to its highest level since early 2021 over the three months to September.

The Office for National Statistics (ONS) said that young people especially were struggling in the tougher hiring climate, with an 85,000 increase in those unemployed aged between 18 to 24 in the three months to October – the biggest jump since November 2022.

The number of young people not in employment, education or training – so-called Neets – has been rising since 2021, and hit the highest level since 2014.

In its report, Niesr said it was “hard to escape the conclusion that the rising cost of labour has deterred full-time job creation, particularly for younger workers”.

Lord Frost, director general of the Institute of Economic Affairs, said the findings “laid bare the costs of the Government’s national insurance and minimum wage hikes, and Employment Rights Act: a spike in the cost of hiring entry-level workers, meaning fewer jobs and opportunities for young people”.

Net zero migration to the UK could shrink the economy and result in taxes rising to plug a funding shortfall, an influential economic think tank has warned.

The National Institute of Economic and Social Research (Niesr) said such a scenario would “put pressure on the public finances” in its latest economic outlook report.

Net migration figures show the difference between the number of people moving long-term to the country and the number of people leaving.

It would be net zero if the number of people leaving was equal to those arriving.

The latest official figures showed that net migration dropped to 204,000 in the year to June, down 69% year-on-year, and raising the possibility of Britain reaching net zero before the end of the decade, according to some forecasters.

Niesr, a research institute which is independent of party-political interests, said net zero migration would slow down employment growth and lead to a smaller proportion of working-age people, therefore resulting in lower tax revenues.

This would leave the government needing to raise taxes to plug a growing funding gap in the long tun.

Reduced tax revenues could also be met through higher borrowing, which would increase the budget deficit by around 0.8% of gross domestic product (GDP), equivalent to around £37 billion in today’s prices, by 2040, according to the analysis.

But if net migration stayed positive, a larger working-age population would broaden the tax base and help stabilise the debt to GDP ratio, Niesr said.

Stephen Millard, Niesr’s deputy director for macroeconomics, said: “Our analysis clearly shows that net zero migration would put pressure on the public finances and worsen the public debt outlook.

“Unlike Japan, the United Kingdom lacks the institutional and financial conditions to support a substantially higher debt ratio.

“We therefore recommend the Government makes a concerted effort to get public debt down, so it has room to respond to a sharp fall in migration or any other negative shock happening to the UK economy.”

Elsewhere in the latest report, Niesr lowered its outlook for UK economic growth in 2025.

It now expects GDP to be 1.4% for the year, down from the 1.5% it forecast in November.

The think tank predicts that the economy will slow to 1.3% in 2027 and 1.1% in 2028 as taxes rise and government spending growth falls.

It is also forecasting the rate of unemployment to rise to a peak of 5.5% in the second half of 2026, before gradually declining.

Meanwhile, Niesr said it was forecasting two cuts to interest rates this year, bringing them down to 3.25% by the end of 2026 as inflation falls.