Autos, RIL set-off losses in banks; Sensex dips 20 pts, Nifty holds 15,100

Stock market updates: Brisk-buying in the last hour of trade helped domestic equity markets end flat on Wednesday amid losses in financial and select IT stocks. The frontline S&P BSE Sensex and the Nifty50 indices breached below their psychological levels of 51,000 and 15,000 to hit an intra-day low of 50,846 and 14,977, respectively.

Recovering from day's low, the Sensex index settled at 51,309 levels on the BSE, down 20 points or 0.04 per cent. Bharti Airtel (down 1.5 per cent), Axis Bank, HDFC Bank, ONGC, PowerGrid, and L&T were the top laggards on the index. Weightage-wise, HDFC Bank, Infosys, ICICI Bank, Axis Bank, and L&T accounted for the maximum losses.

That said, gains in Bajaj Finserv, M&M, Bajaj Finance, Titan, TCS, and Reliance Industries, all up between 1.2 per cent and 3 per cent, trimmed losses.

NSE's Nifty50, on the other hand, closed 3 points, or 0.02 per cent, lower at 15,106.5 levels with 22 of the 50 constituents ending the day in the red.

The broader markets, however, bucked the trend and ended higher today. The S&P BSE MidCap and SmallCap indices added 0.7 per cent and 0.4 per cent, respectively at close.

Sectoral indices on the NSE ended mixed on Wednesday. The Nifty Realty index closed 1.6 per cent higher, followed by gains in the Nifty Pharma and Auto indices, up around 1 per cent each. On the downside, the Nifty Bank and the Nifty Private Bank indices ended 0.7 per cent down.

Global markets

World shares rose to new all-time highs and European indexes strengthened, with market sentiment generally upbeat. In Europe, The STOXX 600 index rose 0.3 per cent, while German’s DAX rose 0.1 per cent.

Earlier in Asia, Japan's Nikkei added 0.2 per cent, Hong Kong's Hang Seng gained 1.2 per cent, and South Korea's Kospi advanced 0.5 per cent.

(With inputs from Reuters)

4:18 PM

MARKET CLOSING COMMENT :: Shrikant Chouhan, Executive VP, Equity Technical Research at Kotak Securities

The benchmark index moved in a narrow range. Today’s intraday activity has been lackluster with a momentum of near 190/650 points. The global cues were tepid too. Most of the indices which were trading on a positive note however, missed the follow through activity. Among sectors, Reality and Auto sectors was the top gainers while profit booking was seen in private banks, metal and selective infra stocks. Post the 1500/5600 points sharp rally, index is trading within a narrow range, which indicates bulls may have started feeling discomfort to go further long near 15250/51810. But technically, a fresh uptrend rally is possible only after 15270/51900. For the next few trading sessions, 15270/51900 should act as a trend decider level, above which we can expect a breakout rally towards 15315-15350/52500-53000. However, trading below 15045 /51300 could possibly open one more correction wave up to 14880/ 50800-50500 levels

4:07 PM

TECH VIEW :: Ashis Biswas, Head of Technical Research, CapitalVia Global Research

The market manages to hold above the Nifty 50 Index support level of 15,000. the technical factors are aligned to support a range-bound market movement in the coming week. Therefore, The short-term traders should use the rally to exit while buying any dip towards the support level around 14,900-14,800. The level of 15,230-15,250 act as short-term resistance. The momentum indicators like RSI, MACD to show divergence, supporting our view that the market is likely to take a pause around this level and stay in a range

 

4:06 PM

MARKET CLOSING COMMENT :: Sahaj Agrawal, Head of Research- Derivatives at Kotak Securities

Previous few weeks have been quite volatile where in Nifty witnessed a 7.5 percent correction and an equally strong bounce back to scale new highs. The medium term undertone continues to be extremely positive; in the near term some consolidation is expected before the up-move resumes. We believe 14700-14800 is a strong entry range for the index and on the higher side one can expect 15700-16000. IT and select BFSI stocks look positive while Metals and Realty are expected to witness consolidation

4:01 PM

MARKET CLOSING COMMENT :: Vinod Nair, Head of Research at Geojit Financial Services

The market witnessed a slip in its momentum during a volatile day as losses in banking stocks weighed on the sentiment. Auto, realty and consumer stocks remained firm along with mid and smallcap indices outperforming. US markets remained positive, supported by upbeat quarterly earnings while the trend was followed by most of the global peers

 

3:59 PM

Market stats

3:57 PM

Stocks that dragged the Sensex lower today

 

3:54 PM

Tata Steel partly paid shares hit 15% lower circuit

3:52 PM

Eicher Motors ends 1.6% lower as Q3 nos disappoint investors

>> Co reported net profit of Rs 534 cr, vs Street expectations of Rs 550 crore

>> Margins contracted 130 bps YoY

3:48 PM

STOCK ALERT :: Page Industries ends 5% higher as Q3 PAT grows 77% YoY

3:46 PM

STOCK ALERT :: Muthoot Finance ends over 6% higher on healthy Q3 results

3:44 PM

Broader markets defy gravity, MidCap index ends 0.7% higher

3:42 PM

Sectoral trends on NSE at Close

3:41 PM

Sensex Heatmap at Close

3:35 PM

CLOSING BELL

Recovering from day's low, the Sensex index settled at 51,309 levels on the BSE, down 20 points or 0.04 per cent.
 

NSE's Nifty50, on the other hand, closed 3 points, or 0.02 per cent, lower at 15,106.5 levels with 22 of the 50 constituents ending the day in the red.

 

3:25 PM

Dec Quarter Result :: SpiceJet reports net loss of Rs 67 cr vs Rs 78 cr profit Yo

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>> Revenue at Rs 1,690 crore vs Rs 3,660 cr YoY