Sensex: Early trading on Wednesday saw Indian equity benchmark indexes trade flat as investors remained cautious due to conflicting patterns in banking equities.
The Sensex began the day 176 points higher at 84,856, but it quickly lost ground and fell into the red, hitting a low of 84,649.
The index was up 134 points, or 0.2%, at 84,820 at around 9:25 AM. At 25,913, up 53 points or 0.2%, the Nifty was also slightly higher.
Regarding the technical picture for the Nifty, experts said that a fall below the immediate support level of 25,700 might result in more consolidation around 25,600–25,550.
“Resistance is seen at 26,000–26,050 on the upside, which remains a crucial hurdle,” market observers said.
Stocks in banking and finance had a mixed pattern. With gains of almost 1% each, SBI, Bajaj Finance, Eternal, and Axis Bank shares were among the top gainers on the Sensex.
However, the market’s upward momentum was hampered by ICICI Bank and HDFC Bank, two prominent laggards.
Performance was moderate in the wider market. In contrast to the SmallCap index, which fell 0.1%, the BSE MidCap index increased by 0.1%.
In the meanwhile, the Indian rupee opened at 91.07 USD.
Asian markets recovered from recent losses with modest gains. During midday trading, South Korea’s KOSPI and Taiwan’s benchmark index both increased by around 0.7%, while Japan’s Nikkei, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng, and China’s Shanghai Composite all saw gains of between 0.2% and 0.4%.
The US Wall Street indexes closed the night with mixed results. Investors’ reaction to the postponed publication of the November employment data caused the S&P 500 to close 0.24 percent down, its third consecutive session of declines.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.62 percent, while the Nasdaq Composite increased by 0.23%.
Foreign institutional investors continued to be net sellers in the Indian market. On Tuesday, domestic institutional investors offered some assistance by purchasing shares valued at Rs 770.76 crore, while FIIs sold shares worth Rs 2,060.76 crore.
