Nifty slips below 11,300; pharma stocks in demand

Trading turned volatile in morning trade as key benchmarks reverted to the day's low after briefly entering positive terrain. The Nifty slipped below the 11,300 mark. At 10:29 IST, the barometer index, the S&P BSE Sensex, was down 91.42 points or 0.24% at 38,532.28. The Nifty 50 index was down 25.65 points or 0.23% at 11,277.65.

The broader market was negative, the S&P BSE Mid-Cap index was down 0.75% while the S&P BSE Small-Cap index was down 0.72%.

The market breadth was negative. On the BSE, 663 shares rose and 1057 shares fell. A total of 89 shares were unchanged. In Nifty 50 index, the breadth was even with 25 stocks advancing and 25 stocks declining.

 

Buzzing Index:

The Nifty Pharma index was up 1.24% to 8,019.15, extending its gains to second consecutive session. The index has surged 6.42% in two trading sessions.

Sun Pharmaceuticals (up 3.5%), Dr Reddy's Laboratories (up 2.4%), Glenmark Pharmaceuticals (up 2.05%), Cipla (up 1.62%), Lupin (up 1.52%), Aurobindo Pharma (up 1.49%), IPCA Laboratories (up 1.19%), GlaxoSmithKline Pharmaceuticals (up 0.88%) and Wockhardt (up 0.28%) advanced.

Stocks in Spotlight:

Vedanta fell 2.09% to Rs 117.05 after Moody's Investors Service downgraded Vedanta Resources corporate family rating (CFR) to B1 from Ba3. Moody's also downgraded the rating on senior unsecured bonds issued by Vedanta and those issued by its wholly owned subsidiary, Vedanta Resources Finance II Plc and guaranteed by Vedanta, to B3 from B2. The outlook on all ratings is stable. The downgrade of Vedanta's ratings was triggered by a sustained deterioration in the company's credit profile, and our expectation that its credit metrics will remain weak for the previous ratings, Moody's said in a press release.

Larsen & Toubro rose 0.1% to Rs 1183 after its water & effluent treatment business secured a 'significant' order from Oman. The order is for the design and execution of a water infrastructure project to enhance the Al Dhakhlia Water Transmission System, Phase - II. The company said that this is a repeat order from the client and has been secured under international competitive bidding. As per the L&T's classification, the valuation of the 'significant' order stands between Rs 1,000 and 2,500 crore.

Monnet Ispat & Energy in a regulatory filing after market hours yesterday informed that it has restarted its operations at Raigarh Plant, Chhattisgarh after necessary modifications to plant and machinery for manufacturing special steel products. The integrated operations were restarted from 2 March 2020 after carrying out general maintenance of plant. The stock was up 2.77% at Rs 13.36.

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