Profit booking halts bull run on bourses
IT stocks in focus amid volatility; ITC tumbles 6%;
image for illustrative purpose
Mkts snap 7-session rally
- BSE Sensex falls 49.54 pts to 61,716.05
- NSE Nifty sheds 58.30 pts to 18,418.75
- Sensex tests lifetime high of 62,245.43
- Nifty touches new intra-day record of 18,604.45
- Fag end sell-off pulls down indices
- Analysts consider that banking majors are still not overvalued
- Investors' wealth soars by Rs12.4 lakh cr to a record Rs274.70 lakh cr in 7 sessions as on Monday
- Hong Kong, Shanghai, Seoul and Tokyo end on positive note
- Europe stocks trading higher
Mumbai: Equity benchmarks closed with modest losses on Tuesday after a seven-session winning streak as investors opted to pocket some gains at record levels. FMCG counters led the losses after HUL's Q2 earnings missed estimates, while IT and private bank stocks stood tall. After scaling the 62,000-mark for the first time, the 30-share BSE Sensex succumbed to selling pressure in fag-end trade to close 49.54 points or 0.08 per cent lower at 61,716.05. Similarly, the Nifty shed 58.30 points or 0.32 per cent to close at 18,418.75. It touched a new intra-day record of 18,604.45 in early deals.
ITC was the top laggard in the Sensex pack, tanking 6.23 per cent, followed by HUL at 4.06 per cent. FMCG major Hindustan Unilever Ltd (HUL) on Tuesday reported a 10.69 per cent rise in consolidated net profit to Rs 2,185 crore for the second quarter ended September 2021. Titan, Tata Steel, UltraTech Cement and PowerGrid were among the other laggards. On the other hand, Tech Mahindra, L&T, Bajaj Finserv, Infosys, HDFC Bank and Kotak Bank were among the gainers, spurting up to 4.12 per cent. The market breadth was negative, with 16 of the 30 Sensex stocks closing in the red.
"The Indian market was showcasing strong resilience, however, the stretched rally booked some gains by the end of the trading day. The IT sector continued to hold the gains while the rest of the recent performers like Reality, PSU Banks and Auto went into a sell-off. Our advice is to transform personal equity portfolios into a balanced basket with high weightage on defensive stocks and sectors. The Indian market is expected to get more stocks and sector specific as market parameters are extremely stretched. While moving to defensives, though near-term trend can be dull, one can give decent weightage to sectors like manufacturing, power, tourism, chemicals, renewables energy and products on a long-term basis," said Vinod Nair, head (research) at Geojit Financial Services.
