Benchmark share indices ended lower for the second straight session on Wednesday dragged by bank shares on worries non-performing assets may rise on the back of a slowing economy and Reliance Industries on concerns of lower gas output from KG-D6 gas field.
The 30-share Sensex provisionally ended at 15,701 down 173 points or 1.1% and the 50-share Nifty ended at 4,698 down 52 points or 0.9%.
______________________________________________
(Updated at 14:35 hrs)
Markets continued to trade sideways in late noon trades as rate-sensitives weighed on the indices. The Sensex, after touching a low of 15,799 recovered marginally to 15,760 - down 115 points. Nifty slipped 36 points at 4,714.
Markets are likely to remain volatile tomorrow as traders roll over their positions ahead of the futures & options expiry. Foreign Institutional Investors bought shares worth Rs 214.31 crore on Tuesday, 27 December 2011, as per provisional data from the stock exchanges. Markets will be looking at the next batch of corporate earnings, which starts in January, for direction.
Asian peers performed weakly with Seoul Composite dropping 1% to 1,825. Nikkei shed 0.2% to8,423 ahead of a Italian bond sale later this week.
All the sectoral indices, barring the consumer durables index, dropped into the negative zone. Rate sensitive realty and bankex dropped around 1.5% each to 1,425 and 9,492, respectively.
SBI slipped 2% at Rs 1,609. The bank will raise term deposit rates for non-resident external accounts by up to 574 basis points from 1 January 2012. Other banking names shed with ICICI Bank sown 4% at Rs 697. The stock was the largest dragger among Sensex stocks.
PSU OMCs slipped as oil prices loomed higher. HPCL shed 2.7%, BPCL was down 1.7% and IOC slipped 2.6% in trades. Crude oil futures traded near six-week high after Iran threatened to block crude transportation through the Strait of Hormuz, sparking oil supply concerns.
Jindal Steel tumbled 8% to Rs 451. Hindalco and Sterlite from the metal space slipped 2-3% each. Mahindra & Mahindra, Reliance, Wipro, ITC and DLF were the other major losers.
Meanwhile, NTPC added 2% at Rs 160. Tata Power added 1.7% to Rs 92 after it decided to buy out BP's stake in solar JV.
Varun Industries dropped 1.4% to Rs 260 on reports that it plans to sell 51 per cent stake in an onshore oil block in Madagascar to Petro China subsidiary for 150 million dollars.
