Mkts choppy with negative bias; ONGC, SBI, SAIL, BHEL drag
At 12:40 hours IST, selling in metal, banking, realty, power, select telecom and cement stocks was putting pressure on the benchmark indices. ONGC was down over 3%, which was dragging the Nifty. Both the indices were volatile. Reliance Industries, Infosys, L&T, Tata Power, Wipro, Grasim, BPCL, Hero Honda, TCS and Maruti were witnessing buying interest.
ONGC, SBI, SAIL, BHEL, DLF, ICICI Bank, HDFC and ITC were main draggers. On the global front, European markets were down.
The Sensex was trading 15,050, down 53 points and the Nifty declined 35 points, to 4,551. The BSE Midcap Index fell 1.3% and the Smallcap Index lost 2.3%.
On the sectoral front, BSE Realty, Metal, Bank and FMCG indices slipped 1-3.8%. However, the IT Index gained 1.7%.
The market breadth was in favour of declines; about 973 shares advanced while 1895 shares declined. Nearly 272 shares were unchanged.
Among the frontliners, Tata Steel, SBI, Sterlite, DLF, Jaiprakash Associates, SAIL and Unitech declined 3.5-5%.
In the midcap space, Torrent Power, Moser Baer, Shriram Transport and Petronet LNG were up 5-9% while Dish TV India, Sun Pharma Advanced, Atlas Copco, Omaxe and Motilal Oswal fell 6.5-10%.
In the smallcap pack, Forbes Gokak, Premier, Halonix, Sanghi Industries and Indraprastha gained 8-13% while Oscar Investment, Foseco India, Zodiac Clothing, NRB Bearings and Sahara One lost 7.5-10%.
Some sugar stocks like Bajaj Hindusthan, Balrampur Chini, Bannariamman, Dhampur Sugar, KCP Sugar, Ponni Sugars (E), Sakthi Sugars, Shree Renuka Sugars, Triveni Engg and Upper Ganges gained 2-5%.