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Major Indian indices continue to stay in red, weighed down by FMCG shares and index heavyweights ITC, ICICI Bank and Reliance Industries.
At 11:26, the Sensex was down by 120 points at 20,092, while the Nifty-50 had slipped 34 points to 5,967.
All major Asian indices maintained their modest upward trend with the Nikkei rallying to 14198, up by about 1.34% from previous day's close, and the Strait Times increasing by about 0.2% to 2,971.73.
The rupee strengthened to 62.46 compared to its previous close of 62.525, as the dollar continued to weaken against all major Asian currencies.
On the sectoral front, BSE FMCG and Oil & Gas indices remained down by 1% each, while the Bankex, Power, Capital Goods, and Consumer Durables also declined marginally by 0.2-0.7% each. BSE Auto, IT, Healthcare, and Realty indices remain slightly positive.
The main gainers on the Sensex at the moment are Mahindra & Mahindra, Tata Steel, Coal India, Wipro, and TCS - all gaining between 1-2%. On the flip-side, ITC, BHEL, Sesa Sterlite, NTPC, and ICICI Bank have each lost between 1.25-2.15% each.
Among other shares, Tech Mahindra has gained by almost 4% to 1839 after its net profit rose 38% quarter-on-quarter to Rs 1,001 crore on a 33.5% year-on-year increase in revenues. On the other hand, Jubilant FoodWorks was trading at 1,070 levels, down by more than 2%, on weak Q3 numbers and negative same-store sales growth.
Shares of Muthoot Finance were up over 2% at Rs 132 after the Muthoot Group announced plans to set up white label automated teller machines across the country.
The broader markets continued to outperform the benchmark indices though, with the BSE Mid-cap and Small-cap indices showing modest gains between 0.2-0.7%.
The market breadth in BSE remains positive, with 1128 shares advancing and 819 shares declining. 112 scrips remained unchanged.
