Key equity benchmarks continued to trade with losses in early afternoon trade. The Nifty hovered in a narrow range of 11,520-11,545. At 12:27 IST, the barometer index, the S&P BSE Sensex, was down 94.38 points or 0.24% at 38,895.36. The Nifty 50 index was down 34.10 points or 0.29% at 11,537.10.
In broader markets, the S&P BSE Mid-Cap index was down 0.11%. The S&P BSE Small-Cap index was down 0.46%.
The market breadth, indicating the overall health of the market, was negative. On the BSE, 846 shares rose and 1147 shares fell. A total of 126 shares were unchanged.
On the derivatives front, the NSE's India VIX, a gauge of market's expectation of volatility over the near term, fell 0.22% at 16.3050. The Nifty October 2019 futures were trading at 11,592.85, a premium of 64.90 points compared with the spot at 11,527.95.
On the options front, the Nifty option chain for 31 October 2019 expiry showed maximum call open interest (OI) of 17.24 lakh contracts at the 11,200 strike price. Maximum put OI of 18.04 lakh contracts was seen at 11,000 strike price. The option chain indicates that Nifty will stay between 11,000 and 11,200 in October expiry.
Quess Corp rose 0.67%. The company announced that it has approved the acquisition of remaining 49% stake in Trimax Smart Infraprojects. Post acquisition, Trimax Smart Infraprojects will become wholly owned subsidiary of the company. The acquisition is for a consideration of Rs 13 crore. Earlier, Quess Corp has allotted 7,54,437 equity shares by way of private placement on a preferential issue basis to Amazon.com NV Investment Holdings LLC.
Strides Pharma Science slumped 7.7% to Rs 303.3 after the company suspended sales of ranitidine tablets in the US market until such time it has clarity of next steps as would be indicated by the USFDA. On 25 September 2019, Strides Pharma received an information request from the US drug regulator to provide test data related to N-nitrosodimethylamine (NDMA) impurities in ranitidine tablets. The data is to be provided to the agency in 30 days. The company has suspended sales of ranitidine tablets in the US market until it has clarity of next steps. The company predominantly sells Ranitidine tablets in the US markets, and its front end sales globally for the product were about $9 million in H1FY2020. The stock hit an intraday low of Rs 302.7 which is also a 52-week low for the counter.
The Anup Engineering was up 3.48% at Rs 457.40. The stock extended yesterday's 7.80% surge triggered by Abakkus Emerging Opportunities Fund acquiring 1 lakh shares of the company on the BSE and another 1.05 lakh shares on the NSE. Both the transactions were struck at Rs 410 per share on 25 September 2019.
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