Sensex and Nifty settled on a lower note today.
New Delhi:
Indian equity benchmarks extended their fall for the fourth straight session on Wednesday after Reserve Bank of India (RBI) hiked its key lending rate. The central bank raised the repo rate by 50 basis points (bps) to 4.90 per cent, after a surprise 40 bps hike earlier in May, to control persistently high inflation. Repo rate is the interest rate at which the RBI lends short-term funds to banks.
The 30-share BSE Sensex fell 215 points or 0.39 per cent to close at 54,892 today, while the broader NSE Nifty moved 60 points or 0.37 per cent down to settle at 16,356.
Mid- and small-cap shares finished on a weak note as Nifty Midcap 100 dropped 0.48 per cent lower and small-cap slipped 0.30 per cent.
Seven out of the 15 sector gauges — compiled by the National Stock Exchange — settled in the red. Sub-indexes Nifty FMCG, Nifty Consumer Durables, Nifty Oil & Gas and Nifty Private Bank underperformed the platform by falling as much as 1.05 per cent, 0.55 per cent, 0.92 per cent and 0.43 per cent, respectively.
On the stock-specific front, Bharti Airtel was the top Nifty loser as the stock cracked 2.98 per cent to Rs 664.90. ITC, Reliance Industries, UPL and Asian Paints were also among the laggards.
The overall market breadth stood negative as 1,554 shares advanced while 1,768 declined on BSE.
On the 30-share BSE index, Airtel, ITC, Reliance, Asian Paints, Axis Bank, IndusInd Bank, ICICI Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Hindustan Unilever, Infosys, PowerGrid and UltraTech Cement were among the top losers.
Meanwhile, shares of Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC), the country’s biggest insurer and largest domestic financial investor, plunged to a new intraday low of Rs 735.95. The stock finally settled 1.98 per cent lower at Rs 738.
In contrast, Tata Steel, SBI, Dr Reddy’s, Bajaj Finance, TCS, Titan, Maruti, Bajaj Finserv, HCL Tech, Wipro, M&M and HDFC twins (HDFC and HDFC Bank) finished in the green.
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