Key equity benchmarks hit a fresh intraday low in afternoon trade. At 13:25 IST, the barometer index, the S&P BSE Sensex, fell 276.06 points or 0.72% at 37,901.89. The Nifty 50 index declined 69.70 points or 0.62% at 11,234.60.
The S&P BSE Mid-Cap index was down 0.73%. The S&P BSE Small-Cap index fell 0.36%.
The market breadth was weak. On the BSE, shares 844 rose and 1,272 shares fell. A total of 142 shares were unchanged.
Moody's Investors Service on Thursday cut India's gross domestic product (GDP) growth forecast for 2019-20 to 5.8% from the earlier estimate of 6.2%. It attributed the deceleration to an investment-led slowdown that has broadened into consumption, driven by financial stress among rural households and weak job creation. It expects growth to pick up to 6.6% in FY21 and around 7% over the medium term.
On 4 October 2019, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) cut its FY20 GDP growth rate forecast sharply to 6.1% from 6.9%.
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Grasim Industries (up 3.13%), Reliance Industries (up 2.49%), Hindustan Unilever (up 1.74%), Sun Pharmaceutical Industries (up 1.48%) and HCL Technologies (up 0.66%) advanced.
Yes Bank (down 5.55%), ICICI Bank (down 3.13%), GAIL (down 3.10%), Tata Motors (down 2.65%) and State Bank of India (down 2.63%) declined.
IndusInd Bank (down 0.73%) will declare its Q2 results today, 10 October 2019.
Tata Consultancy Services (TCS) was down by 0.79% ahead of its Q2 results today, 10 October 2019.
Vodafone Idea jumped 5.65%. Bharti Airtel surged 4.31%. Shares of two telecom firms advanced after rival Reliance Jio Infocomm started charging for voice calls made to subscribers of other telcos.
Telecom shares surged amid hopes that the price hike could possibly herald an end in India's bruising telecom price war unleashed by the entry of Reliance Jio. Forced by regulatory uncertainty, Mukesh Ambani's unlisted telecom firm Reliance Jio Infocomm on Wednesday announced that it will charge customers 6 paise per minute for voice calls made to rival phone networks, but will compensate them by giving free data of equal value.
The S&P BSE Telecom index soared 8.92% in three trading sessions to its current 979.04 points, from a recent closing low of 898.78 points on 4 October 2019.
A brokerage house has reportedly maintained its 'buy' rating on Bharti Airtel with a target at Rs 414 per share and 'hold' recommendation on Vodafone Idea with a target price at Rs 7 per share.
Larsen & Toubro (L&T) was down 0.68%. L&T announced that it has won 'significant' contracts for its power transmission and material handling businesses. The company has secured an order for Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) of a 400kV overhead transmission line between the towns of Chimuara and Alto Molocue in Zambezia Province, Mozambique. In the United Arab Emirates (UAE), the business has secured an order for the design, supply and construction of a 220kV substation project from one of the government utilities. In metallurgy and material handling business, the company has secured EPC order from NTPC for coal sizing and transportation through high capacity long distance pipe conveyors for Kerandari, a coal mining project in the Hazaribagh district of Jharkhand.
Overseas, shares in Europe and Asia were mixed on Thursday. Media reports suggested that China has lowered expectations for significant progress from this week's trade talks with the United States, even as President Donald Trump on Wednesday expressed fresh optimism.
Top US and Chinese trade and economic officials will meet in Washington on Thursday and Friday to try to end a trade war that is slowing the global economy. Chinese Vice Premier Liu He, US Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer and Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin are due to take part.
Meanwhile, in Europe the latest reports from Germany states how exports have fallen sharply for the month of August 2019. Fears engulf the market sentiments as downtrend in European manufacturing sector may push the economy towards recession.
US stocks gained on Wednesday on hopes of progress in US-China trade talks, though stocks pared gains late after Chinese officials said Beijing had lowered expectations for negotiations this week.
Most Federal Reserve policymakers supported the need for an interest rate cut in September, minutes of the central bank's last policy meeting showed, but they remained divided on the path ahead for monetary policy. The readout of the meeting, released on Wednesday, also showed that the Fed agreed it would soon need to discuss increasing the size of its balance sheet following ructions in short-term money markets.
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