Sensex, Nifty Seen Tad Higher At Open

(RTTNews) - Indian shares look set to open a tad higher on Friday, with falling oil prices and support from FII buying likely to underpin investor sentiment.

Market heavyweight Reliance Industries is due to unveil its fiscal first-quarter results later in the day.

Benchmark indexes Sensex and the Nifty rose around half a percent each on Thursday to extend gains for a fifth straight session, while the rupee gained 20 paise to close at 79.85 against the greenback.

Asian markets were mostly higher this morning, though overall gains remained muted on growing concerns about the economic outlook, with social media company Snap disclosing a wider-than-expected loss in its second-quarter earnings report.

An uptick in the U.S. dollar weighed on gold prices, while oil prices held steady after declining around 3 percent in the previous session amid a rise in supplies from Libya and on signs of weakening demand in the United States, the world's top oil consumer.

U.S. stocks finished higher for a third straight session overnight as investors assessed a slew of earnings and disappointing economic data.

While jobless claims rose for the third straight week to hit a fresh eight-month high, regional manufacturing activity unexpectedly contracted at a faster rate in July, separate reports showed.

The tech-heavy Nasdaq composite surged 1.4 percent in the wake of Tesla's remarkable quarterly results and the S&P 500 added 1 percent to close at its highest level since June 9, while the Dow gained half a percent.

European stocks ended mostly higher on Thursday as worries over an energy supply crunch eased and the European Central Bank surprised markets with a bigger-than-expected half-point interest rate hike, marking the first rate increase in over a decade.

The pan European Stoxx 600 inched up 0.4 percent. The German DAX eased 0.3 percent, while France's CAC 40 index rose 0.3 percent and the U.K.'s FTSE 100 finished marginally higher.