India Fear & Greed Index — how scared or greedy is the market right now?
The CNN-style sentiment gauge every American investor checks daily, properly rebuilt for Indian markets. 5 live components — VIX, put-call ratio, 125-day momentum, risk premium, 52-week range — averaged into a single 0-100 score. Contrarian reads at extremes have historically marked turning points.
The 5 components, decoded
Implied-volatility gauge from NIFTY options. Lower VIX = lower expected forward moves = complacency (scored as greed). Anchored to 10-year percentile bands: at the p10 (~11) scored 85, at the median (~15.6) scored 50, at the p90 (~22) scored 15.
Positioning. Extreme high PCR (heavy put-hedging) is genuine fear; moderate-high is contrarian greed; extreme low is complacent call-buying / chase greed. The tent-shape mapping picks up positioning stress at both tails.
Spot ÷ 125-day simple moving average. Captures the medium-term trend regime. +5% above SMA scored 85 (greed); −5% below scored 15 (fear).
VIX minus 21-day realised vol. Wide positive spread = market paying up for downside protection (fear). Compressed or negative = complacency / no fear priced (greed). Typical India premium is +2 to +6; anything outside that band is informative.
Today's close as % of (1-year high − 1-year low). Near 100% = near top of annual range = greed anchor. Near 0% = near bottom = fear anchor. A simple, hard-to-game scalar.
How contrarians use it
- • Score < 20. Extreme fear. In US data, CNN's F&G below 20 has historically been followed by above-average 60-day returns. Indian analogues (March 2020, June 2022) show similar patterns. Good zone to nibble into risk.
- • 20-40. Fear — trend is down but panic is mostly priced. Watch for breadth improvement before adding aggressively.
- • 40-60. Neutral. No edge from sentiment alone. Defer to price + setup.
- • 60-80. Greed — trend is up, positioning leaning long. Size new longs smaller; look for exit signals from breadth.
- • > 80. Extreme greed. Historical analogues: Oct 2021, Sep 2024. Above-average probability of 3-6 month corrections. Reduce leverage, tighten trailing stops, increase cash.
Related sentiment tools
Put today's F&G reading into historical context
Axel compares today's composite score + the mix of sub-scores to the closest historical analogues in the last 10 years, flags what happened in the 1/3/6-month windows that followed, and explains which sub-scores were decisive. Analysis framing, not a trade call.
Research tool · not investment advice.
Axel Markets is an information + analytics product. We are not a SEBI-registered Research Analyst (RA) or Investment Adviser (IA). Nothing on this page is a buy, sell, or hold recommendation. Past performance is not indicative of future returns. Verify all data against the authoritative source (NSE, BSE, AMFI, SEBI, company RHP / factsheet) before acting. Composite is computed from India VIX + NIFTY option-chain PCR (NSE public data, 3-minute snapshot) and NIFTY daily closes (Yahoo Finance public chart API, free and stable). Component weightings (equal 1/5th) are a deliberate simple-mean choice — sophisticated users can interpret the sub-scores independently. Index values are reference sentiment indicators, not a buy/sell signal. Past-analog patterns are educational only.