Amidst the increasing unrest in global markets, increasing tension between Iran and America and huge rise in crude oil prices, the Indian market was under a lot of pressure today. However, after a day of volatility, the major indices closed almost flat. The Sensex closed at 75,315 with a marginal gain of 77 points, while the Nifty 50 closed at 23,649, up just 6 points. Despite minor movements in key indices, pressure was clearly visible in mid-cap and small-cap stocks. Nifty Bank fell 173 points to close at 53,537. Meanwhile, the Nifty Smallcap index witnessed a massive fall of 1.26%. This shows that investors in the market are currently busy in profit-booking in small stocks.
Huge boom in IT sector
In today’s trading session, IT sector emerged as the strongest performing sector. Strong buying was seen in many leading IT stocks. Infosys gained nearly 2%, making it one of the top gainers in the Nifty. Mid-cap IT stocks also showed great momentum; Coforge gained 5%, while Persistent Systems gained about 4.75%. Tech Mahindra and Oracle Financial Services also gained around 4% each. This boom in the IT sector supported the entire market.
Tata Steel: The biggest falling stock in Nifty
In the Nifty 50 index, Tata Steel was the worst performing stock, falling about 3.5%. Weakness was also seen in Power Grid, which fell by more than 3%. Major stocks like SBI and Bajaj Auto also remained under pressure. On the contrary, strong buying was seen in Bharti Airtel, Sun Pharma and Bajaj Finserv. Airtel gained about 1.6%, while Sun Pharma gained 1.5%.
Stock movements due to earnings results
Today there was a huge jump in the prices of many stocks, due to the announcement of their quarterly earnings results. Gland Pharma shares jumped a whopping 15%. In contrast, Amber Enterprises declined about 15%. Fusion Finance fell 9%, while KEC International fell nearly 10%. This clearly shows that the market is taking a tough stance towards those stocks whose earnings are weak or whose estimates are weak.
Selling in consumer durables shares
Today there was a lot of pressure on the consumer durables sector. Bajaj Electricals fell about 8%. Symphony fell 7.7% and PG Electroplast fell 5.5%. Shares of Kens Technology also fell by more than 4%. This decline in this sector has increased the concerns of investors.
In today’s trading session, Raymond and GE Shipping emerged as the top gainers, gaining around 11% each. Good growth was also seen in Stylum Industries and Arvind. In contrast, Azad Engineering declined more than 8%. Shares like Alembic Pharma, Himadri Specialty Chemicals and MapMyIndia also closed with losses. Sensex fell by over 900 points and Nifty by nearly 300 points in the early hours due to heavy selling in realty, consumer durables, banking and NBFC stocks. However, the benchmark indices later recovered from their intraday lows.
