Indian equity benchmarks traded higher in early trade on Wednesday with gains of nearly 1 per cent each tracking positive global cues and buying in IT stocks.

In morning trade, Sensex was trading 0.94 per cent or 695 points higher at 74,548.69, hitting an intraday high against previous close of 73,852.90.

Similarly, Nifty surged 0.86 per cent or almost 200 points to 23,086.95 from previous close of 22,888.95.

Earlier in the day the benchmarks opened higher, with the Sensex opening at 74,337.93, up 485.03 points or 0.66 per cent.

Nifty opened at 23,016.00, up 127.05 points or 0.56 per cent.

Sector-wise, Nifty IT, Nifty PSU Bank, Nifty Cement, Nifty MidSmall IT & Telecom and Nifty Oil & Gas increased up to 1.97 per cent.

However, Nifty Media and Nifty Chemicals were trading in the red.

According to market experts, as Brent crude prices and US bond yields remained elevated, the market is likely to remain under pressure and the sell-on-rally construct will continue in the near-term.

However, improving earnings growth, fair valuations of large-caps and strong domestic liquidity will support the market on declines, they said.

IT and banking which have performed well in Q2 and are attractively valued, will see strong DII-led accumulation on corrections, the experts said.

Notably, the Q2 results season has started on a positive note and market action going forward will be more stock-specific and results-sensitive, experts noted.

In the last trading session on October 19, FIIs remained net sellers, offloading equities worth approximately Rs 1,148 crore, while DIIs continued to support the market with net purchases of around Rs 3,200 crore.

In addition, Asian shares traded higher following gains in US stock futures after upbeat earnings from major AI-linked companies renewed investor interest in technology shares.

Tesla has scheduled its annual shareholder meeting for December 3, where investors will vote on the re-election of Chief Executive Elon Musk and other directors, along with an advisory resolution on executive compensation and the appointment of the company’s auditor.

According to a proxy filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission, Tesla has nominated Musk, Chair Robyn Denholm and director JB Straubel for new three-year terms on the board.

Shareholders will also be asked to approve, on a non-binding basis, executive compensation for 2025 and ratify PricewaterhouseCoopers as Tesla’s independent auditor for the fiscal year ending December 31.

Moreover, the proxy statement disclosed executive compensation attributed to Musk for 2025 of about $158.36 billion, consisting entirely of stock-based awards.

The figure reflects the accounting value assigned to performance-linked equity grants and does not represent cash compensation received by the billionaire entrepreneur.

Tesla said the awards remain contingent on the achievement of specified market capitalisation and operational targets.

The company previously reported in May that Musk’s realised compensation for 2025 was zero with none of the 12 tranches tied to the incentive program having been earned.

The equity package comprises roughly 423.7 million restricted shares that vest only after predetermined milestones are met.

In addition, any earned shares are generally subject to a five-year holding requirement, with limited exceptions.

The annual meeting will be held at Tesla’s Gigafactory Texas facility in Austin at 3 pm. However, Central Time and will also be accessible online.

Additionally, the filing highlighted several board-level links between Tesla and SpaceX.

However, the proxy statement did not reference any potential merger involving Tesla and SpaceX.

Apart from that, Elon Musk-backed SpaceX is scheduled to announce its third-quarter results on Tuesday after its shares fell nearly 35 per cent from their post-listing high.

This will be the company’s second quarterly earnings report since going public in June, following a volatile stretch for the stock.

The stock has dropped around 35 per cent from the record high it hit soon after its debut.

The independent Oversight Board on Tuesday criticised Meta, saying the social media firm must improve the transparency and consistency of its election-related enforcement after a series of moderation failures involving political accounts in the United States and Brazil.

In a statement, the Board said it remained concerned by what it described as recurring shortcomings in Meta’s election integrity efforts and warned that mistakes in content moderation risk either suppressing legitimate political speech or undermining public confidence in electoral processes.

It pointed to the removal of political activist accounts linked to the ‘No Kings’ movement in the United States and restrictions placed on accounts associated with Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva during election periods as examples of enforcement actions that fuelled concerns about electoral interference.

According to the Board, the erroneous action against the No Kings Instagram account should have been detected by Meta’s safeguards designed to prevent moderation mistakes.

Meanwhile, it also questioned why the accounts were not included in Meta’s Cross-Check program which provides additional human review for high-profile civic and political entities before actions are taken that could affect participation in major public events.

The Board said Meta’s enforcement of fraud-related policies against ad accounts linked to Lula during Brazil’s presidential election campaign similarly represented a failure that should have been escalated to specialist reviewers.

The comments revisit concerns raised by the board following Brazil’s 2022 presidential election, when it called on Meta to establish measurable benchmarks for assessing the effectiveness of its election integrity programs and to publish relevant performance data.

While Meta regularly discloses broad statistics such as the number of advertisements archived or accounts removed, the Board said the company has yet to provide public metrics that adequately measure the effectiveness of its enforcement systems or identify significant shortcomings.

Moreover, the Board also warned that the wrongful removal of political content ahead of elections could have a chilling effect on political participation and potentially undermine electoral integrity.

“Automated enforcement tools must take language, nuance, and political context into account to better protect political speech that does not incite violence,” according to Oversight Board.

Meta had pledged in 2025 to reduce moderation errors while allowing greater freedom of expression around elections and political debate.

The Board said recent incidents suggest further improvements are needed for the company to meet that commitment.