Mumbai: IT exporter Infosys may have been the star of the day, but the benchmark BSE Sensex lost ground heavily, weighed down by some late-session selling pressure, which ended the day 238 points lower at 28,182.14.
"Investor focus was on the monsoon session of Parliament and heavyweight earnings as the market traded sideways and finally closed in the negative territory," said Alex Mathews, Head Research, Geojit BNP Paribas Financial Services.
Cautious investors steered clear of healthcare, realty, refinery, banking and FMCG counters.
Sun Pharma dealt the maximum blow, plunging as much as 15 percent, its biggest daily fall, after the company warned that its earnings numbers would be tepid at best.
But the silver lining was Infosys whose stock zoomed 11 percent after the company reported a nearly 5 percent yoy increase in consolidated net profit at Rs 3,030 crore for the June quarter. Its bullish revenue guidance lifted other IT stocks too.
The Sensex started the day on a weaker note at 28,391.82, but recovered immediately to 28,518.06 on the back of solid foreign capital inflows coupled with Infosys' positive show.
Intra-day, it fell to 28,138.30 before settling at 28,182.14, down 237.98 points, or 0.84 percent, largely due to fag-end profit-booking by participants.
The 50-share Nifty dropped 74 points, or 0.86 percent, to close at 8,529.45 after trading between 8,517.90 and 8,646.75.
Of the 30 Sensex stocks, 23 ended lower while only seven notched up gains.
"The initial Q1 FY16 results are a mixed bag, providing no clear picture of the earnings outlook. The expectation regarding results is low," said Vinod Nair, Head-Fundamental Research, Geojit BNP Paribas Financial Services.
Besides Sun Pharma, others that ran up losses were Vedanta, Lupin, ONGC, Tata Steel and Cipla.
In spite of the cloudy sentiment, Bharti Airtel, Wipro Hero MotoCorp and Bajaj Auto registered gains.
In terms of BSE sectoral play, healthcare fell 5.93 percent, along with realty, oil and gas and FMCG. However, IT ended in the positive territory.
The broader markets couldn't escape the selling pressure as the BSE small-cap and mid-cap indices fell up to 1.59 percent.
Going ahead, investors are waiting for the outcome of the the monsoon session of Parliament, which is going to decide the fate of key legislative reforms such as GST and Land Bills.
According to provisional data, foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) net bought shares worth Rs 714.40 crore yesterday.
The market breadth turned negative as 1,883 stocks finished lower, 946 closed higher while 101 ruled steady. The total turnover rose to Rs 3,203.58 crore, from Rs 2,775.95 crore yesterday.
European stocks were trading mixed today while Asian markets signed off higher.
US stocks closed mildly higher yesterday with the Nasdaq hitting another record as earnings reports came in.
