Equity benchmark indices pared their intra-day gains and were dragged by index majors ITC and State Bank of India on Thursday as their fourth quarter earnings failed to please investors.
After trading in the green for most of the day, the 30-share BSE Sensex closed 128.90 points, or 0.21%, lower at 61,431.74. It touched a high of 61,955.90 and a low of 61,349.34 in the day’s trade.
The NSE Nifty closed 51.80 points or 0.28% down at 18,129.95.
Among Sensex firms, ITC, SBI, Titan, Power Grid, Larsen & Toubro, Tata Motors, Hindustan Unilever and UltraTech Cement were the major laggards.
ITC shares declined 2% even as the company reported a 22.66% rise in consolidated net profit at ₹5,225.02 crore for the fourth quarter ended March 2023.
SBI declined 1.77% despite an 83% rise in net profit of the country’s largest bank to ₹16,694.51 crore in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2022-23 on higher interest income and lower provisioning.
Bajaj Finance, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Bharti Airtel, ICICI Bank, Asian Paints, HCL Technologies, HDFC and HDFC Bank were the biggest gainers.
In Asia, bourses in Seoul, Tokyo, Shanghai and Hong Kong ended in the green.
European markets were also trading with gains. On Wednesday, the US market closed with a good gain.
On Wednesday, optimistic US President Joe Biden declared he was confident the US would avoid an unprecedented and potentially catastrophic debt default, saying talks with congressional Republicans had been productive.
“The market traded in a volatile trend on the weekly closing day and ended with a marginal decline. Strong global cues triggered the gap up, however profit-booking in major index majors nullified the gains as the day progressed. It has been a healthy consolidation so far, however, volatility across sectors is keeping traders on their toes,” said Ajit Mishra, VP – Technical Research, Religare Broking Ltd.
According to exchange data, foreign institutional investors (FIIs) bought equities worth Rs 149.33 crore on Wednesday as they continued their buying activity.
Meanwhile, global oil benchmark Brent crude fell 0.61% to $76.49 per barrel.
Falling for the second straight session on Wednesday, the 30-share BSE benchmark closed 371.83 points, or 0.60%, lower at 61,560.64. The Nifty closed 104.75 points, or 0.57%, down at 18,181.75.