Indian shares may open higher on Friday, tracking firm global markets as investors temporarily set aside trade worries and turned their focus to the earnings season. Several leading U.S. financial companies are due to report their quarterly results later in the day.
Closer home, Infosys is all set to release its first quarterly results after market hours today.
There is some disappointment on the macroeconomic front as industrial output and consumer inflation data released on Thursday painted a mixed picture of the economy.
Consumer price inflation rose to 5 percent in June from 4.87 percent in May while analysts expected it to climb to 5.29 percent. On a monthly basis, consumer prices gained only 0.58 percent in the month.
Industrial output climbed 3.2 percent annually in May, which was slower than the 4.4 percent increase economists had forecast and about 4.8 percent rise logged in April.
Meanwhile, a day after the World Bank's latest rankings placed India as the world's sixth-largest economy, Union Minister Arun Jaitley said India could end up at the fifth position soon, if firm growth continues.
Benchmark indexes Sensex and the Nifty jumped 0.8 percent and 0.7 percent respectively on Thursday while the rupee surged by 20 paise to end at a one-week high of 68.57 per dollar on expectations that falling oil prices could narrow the country's current account deficit.
Asian markets extended gains from the previous session as investors awaited dollar-denominated Chinese trade data for direction. Customs data showed earlier that yuan-denominated exports rose an annual 4.9 percent in the first half of the year, while imports rose 11.5 percent.
The dollar held steady against its major rivals while oil edged down and remained on track for a second weekly fall.
Overnight, U.S. stocks rallied as earnings optimism helped investors shrugged off trade war fears. Consumer price inflation saw its largest annual gain since February 2012, keeping the Fed on track to raise interest rates gradually.
The Dow and the S&P 500 rose about 0.9 percent while the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite climbed 1.4 percent to reach a fresh record closing high.
European markets also finished solidly higher on Thursday as investors held out hopes for resumption of talks between the U.S. and China.
The pan-European Stoxx Europe 600 index gained 0.8 percent. The German DAX rose 0.6 percent, France's CAC 40 index climbed 1 percent and the U.K.'s FTSE 100 advanced 0.8 percent.
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