Mumbai: Sensex on Tuesday (January 21) ended down 205.10 points or 0.49 percent at 41323.81, while the Nifty settles at 12169.70, down 54.80 points. The top gainer stocks were Bharti Infratel, Zee Entertainment, and BPCL, while Tata Steel, Mahindra & Mahindra, and Tata Motors were major laggards.
About 1082 shares advanced, 1364 shares declined, and 168 shares remained unchanged, while Bharti Airtel and Reliance Industries were seen to be the most active stocks.
During early hours on Tuesday, equity benchmark indices were flat after the International Monetary Fund (IMF) trimmed its global growth forecasts to 2.9 per cent for 2019 and 3.3 per cent for 2020.
At 10:15 am, the BSE S&P Sensex was down by 91 points to 41,438 while the Nifty 50 edged lower by 15 points at 12,209. Sectoral indices at the National Stock Exchange were mixed.
Among stocks, Asian Paints fell by 1.9 per cent at Rs 1,813.90 per share. UPL dropped by 1.7 per cent, Mahindra and Mahindra by 1.5 per cent, Tata Steel by 1.3 per cent and Hero MotoCorp by 1.1 per cent. However, Bharti InfraTel gained by 5.7 per cent to Rs 234.60 per cent. Zee Entertainment, Coal India, IndusInd Bank, and ICICI Bank witnessed marginal gains.
Meanwhile, Asian shares got off to a cautious start lacking any lead from Wall Street and after the IMF revised outlook for world growth this year.
MSCI`s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan slipped 0.9%, while Japan`s Nikkei lost 0.8% and Shanghai blue chips shed 0.9%. E-Mini futures for the S&P 500 eased 0.3%.
The mood has already been cautious after the International Monetary Fund trimmed its global growth forecasts, mostly due to a surprisingly sharp slowdown in India and other emerging markets.
The IMF now sees growth at 3.3% this year, down from 3.4% and also cut the 2021 forecast to 3.4% from 3.6%. Yet it still lifted the outlook for China to 6%.
Against a basket of currencies, the dollar was steady at 97.627 after touching a four-week high at 97.729.
Spot gold edged up to $1,566.71 per ounce, and back toward a seven-year peak of $1,610.90 reached last week.
Oil prices hesitated, after gaining on the risk of supply disruption in Libya. Brent crude futures eased 10 cents to $65.10 a barrel, while U.S. crude rose 11 cents to $58.65.
(With Agency Inputs)
