Benchmark indices were trading flat with narrow movement on Thursday, dragged by metals.
At 1 pm, the BSE Sensex was near the day’s low (49,781.48) at 49,858.74, down 43.9 points or 0.09 per cent. It hit an intra-day high of 50,099.17. Nifty 50 was at 14,992.50, down 37.65 points or 0.25 per cent. It hit an intra-day high of 15,069.80 and a low of 14,960.50.
Gaurav Garg, Head Of Research, CapitalVia Global Research Ltd, said, “In morning trades, Indian equity indexes continued their lacklustre performance ahead of the weekly expiration of index futures and option contracts.”
“Traders remained cautious, with rating agency ICRA stating that the increase in headline figures of key economic indicators in April is attributable to the base effect and that the economy will see a hard time as consumer morale remains low. US market decline further, as Federal Reserve participants agreed that the US economy remained far from the central bank’s target. Asian markets were mostly trading in red following the global peers,” added Garg.
Mahindra & Mahindra, Cipla, BPCL, Titan and IndusInd Bank were the top gainers on the Nifty 50 while Tata Steel, Hindalco, Britannia, ONGC and Tata Motors were the top laggards.
metals under pressure
On the sectoral front, majority of indices were in the red.
Metals and auto continued to remain under pressure. FMCG and IT stocks also recorded losses.
Nifty Metal was down 2.43 per cent while Nifty Auto was down 0.35 per cent. Nifty FMCG was down 0.42 per cent. Nifty IT was down 0.37 per cent.
Pharma stocks also erased previous session’s gains with Nifty Pharma down 0.04 per cent.
Nifty PSU Bank remained resilient and was up 0.63 per cent. Nifty Realty also managed to extend gains, trading marginally higher and was up 0.54 per cent.
Broader indices remain resilient
Broader indices remained resilient in a volatile market, outperforming the benchmarks.
Nifty Midcap 50 was up 0.11 per cent while Nifty Smallcap 50 was up 0.30 per cent.
The S&P BSE Midcap was up 0.13 per cent while the S&P BSE Smallcap was up 0.56 per cent.
Notably, the volatility index rose 1.08 per cent to 19.53.