Tuesday, September 22, 2026 · overnight moves, fresh filings & what matters in today's session
Snapshot: commodities, rates & macro
| Item | Level | Move | One-line note |
|---|
| Gold (spot) | $4,353.31/oz | -0.56% | Eased Monday; failed to reclaim $4,400 after the record run |
| Silver (spot) | $66.22/oz | -0.06% | Held firm as gold slipped; gold-silver ratio compressed to 65.7 |
| Brent crude | ~$101.1-101.5/bbl | +0.8% this morning | Settled near $100.3 Monday; well off last week's ~$108 spike |
| WTI crude | ~$93/bbl | +0.7% this morning | Saudi shipment recovery offsetting West Asia risk |
| LME copper (cash) | $14,788/t | +1.8% Mon | Fresh leg up from $14,529 Friday; supply tightness persists |
| LME aluminium (cash) | $3,285/t | flat | Sept 18 settlement; Monday's figure not yet published |
| US 10-year yield | 4.96% | -4 bp Mon | Eased from 5.00% as oil fell; PCE data Friday is the next input |
| India 10-year G-sec | 7.05% | steady | Absorbed the second Rs 25,000 cr OMO sale without a sell-off |
| USD/INR | ~95.75 | rupee firmer | Closed 95.81 Monday (+15p); another ~6p stronger this morning on softer oil |
| RBI OMO sale, tranche 2 | Rs 25,000 cr | accepted | Second of three liquidity-draining auctions; tranche 3 on Sept 28 |
| RBI services-export survey | +8.2% FY26 | released Mon | Software services exports stayed resilient despite tariff noise |
The big picture: an AI-led record on Wall Street, cheaper oil & a quiet tightening at home
- Overnight, in one line. US equities rallied to a record Nasdaq close on semiconductor strength & signs of a US-China thaw, oil kept sliding from last week's spike, & Treasury yields eased; Asia is following this morning with Kospi up 1.6% while Japan stays shut for the Silver Week holidays through September 23.
- The thaw driving risk appetite. Washington & Beijing have opened a discussion channel on AI safety (the Bessent-He Lifeng track), & a Trump-Xi meeting is scheduled for later this week, the first since the tariff escalation began. Markets are trading the possibility of incremental trade & technology accommodation, not a settled deal; that gap between hope & text is where this week's volatility will live.
- India's session ahead. Monday's 564-point Sensex rally (close 74,859; Nifty 23,414) was built on four sessions of falling crude, & this morning began the same way: GIFT Nifty traded near 23,499 pre-open, about 85 points above Monday's Nifty close. By mid-morning the cash market had faded to roughly flat, with realty leading, IT the only sector in the red, & the midcap & smallcap indices holding small gains.
- The quiet tightening. While equities watch Washington, the RBI completed its second Rs 25,000 crore OMO sale (an open market operation, here the RBI selling bonds to drain banking-system liquidity). The 10-year held at 7.05%. With CPI at 4.82% & bank economists pencilling in October & December rate hikes, the monetary direction in India is tightening even before the October 5-7 MPC meets.
- The warning worth filing. CEA data show coal stocks at power plants down to 22.9 million tonnes, 39% of the norm & about 7 days of generation against a normative 18, with 74 plants critical. Nothing has broken yet; the point is that the buffer is thin & September demand is running 17.6% above last year. Detail in Macro below.