After hitting fresh intraday low in mid-morning trade, the key benchmark indices staged a mild recovery in early afternoon trade. At 12:25 IST, the barometer index, the S&P BSE Sensex, was down 208.22 points or 0.71% at 29,277.23. The Nifty 50 index was down 66.85 points or 0.73% at 9,054.65. The Sensex and the Nifty, both, hit their lowest level in almost two weeks. Weak global cues played the spoilsport for domestic stocks.
Earlier, the two key equity benchmarks saw a gap-down opening on negative Asian stocks. Indices extended early slide and hit fresh intraday low in morning trade. Key benchmark indices continued to trade with weakness in mid-morning trade.
The Sensex fell 144.04 points or 0.49% at the day's high of 29,341.41 at the onset of the session. The index lost 265.86 points or 0.9% at the day's low of 29,219.59 in mid-morning trade, its lowest level since 10 March 2017. The Nifty fell 48.60 points or 0.53% at the day's high of 9,072.90 at the onset of the session. The index lost 85.45 points or 0.94% at the day's low of 9,036.05 in mid-morning trade, its lowest level since 10 March 2017.
The BSE Mid-Cap index was down 0.79%. The fall in this index was higher than Sensex's decline in percentage terms. The BSE Small-Cap index was down 0.52%. The fall in this index was lower than Sensex's decline in percentage terms.
The broad market depicted weakness. There were almost two losers against every gainer on BSE. 1,637 shares declined and 858 shares rose. A total of 174 shares were unchanged.
Realty stocks fell. DLF (down 2.02%), Indiabulls Real Estate (down 1.27%), D B Realty (down 0.58%), Unitech (down 1.89%), Godrej Properties (down 0.68%), Prestige Estates Projects (down 0.6%), Oberoi Realty (down 1.88%) and Parsvnath Developers (down 2.51%) declined.
Sobha (up 7.05%) and Housing Development and Infrastructure (up 0.51%) rose.
Telecom stocks declined. Bharti Airtel (down 2.69%), Idea Cellular (down 0.48%), MTNL (down 3.31%), Tata Teleservices (Maharashtra (down 2.16%) and Reliance Communications (down 1.18%) declined.
Shares of Bharti Infratel shed 0.1%. Bharti Infratel is a provider of tower and related infrastructure and is a unit of Bharti Airtel.
Delta Corp rose 6.65% to Rs 180.40 on reports a domestic brokerage initiated coverage on the stock with a 'buy' rating and a target price at Rs 229. The brokerage reportedly cites the approval of a casino in Daman as a key upside trigger and sees gaming capacity to double. Meanwhile, the company's board will meet later today, 22 March 2017, to consider raising funds by issue of equity shares and / or such other securities, as may be permitted, by way of a public or private offering, including a qualified institutions placement or any combination thereof.
Fiberweb (India) rose 3.97% to Rs 294.50 at 11:29 IST on BSE after the company said it will supply its products to US-based retail giant Wal-Mart. The announcement was made during trading hours today, 22 March 2017.
Fiberweb (India) announced that it has planned increase in sale of converted products which have much better margins than normal products. Earlier in October 2016, the company's customers from USA had visited the firm's production facilities at Daman and they were satisfied with the international standard of production facility, stringent quality control parameters and machineries as well as ambience. They confirmed the company's facilities are as per approved FDA Standard.
Overseas, Asian stocks were trading lower as investors re-evaluated their optimism around the 'Trump trade.' In Japan, exports rose at the sharpest rate in two years in February as demand from China and other parts of Asia jumped, underpinning a modest but continuing recovery in the world's third-largest economy. Merchandise exports grew 11.3% in value terms from a year earlier to 6.347 trillion yen, after increasing 1.3% in January, according to data released yesterday, 21 March 2017 by the Ministry of Finance.
US stocks sank yesterday, 21 March 2017 as the Dow and the Nasdaq logged their worst daily drops since September, while the S&P 500 also tumbled the most in a single session in five months on concerns about US president Donald Trump's ability to push through major reforms.
Shares have been broadly stronger globally since the US presidential elections, buoyed by Donald Trump's talk of reforming the tax system and investing in infrastructure. However, a series of recent roadblocks ahead of the coming vote to dismantle the Affordable Care Act is seeing the market question Trump's ability to deliver on his policy promises, and triggered a pullback.
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