Stock market ends in red amid highly volatile session

Representational Picture


Indian benchmark indices ended lower in the highly volatile session on Friday.

Sensex closed 269 points, or 0.35%, lower at 77,209.90, while the Nifty 50 closed with a loss of 66 points, or 0.28%, at 23,501.10.

Sensex opened at a record high of 77,543.22, created a fresh all-time high of 77,851.63, as investors piled onto banking stocks.

But the 30-stock index also touched a low of 76,954.87, as traders booked profit at record high levels.

Nifty 50 opened at a record high of 23,629.85, touched another record high at 23,664.00, before falling into the red as investors booked profit.

The BSE Midcap index fell 0.26%, following the trend of the largecaps. However, the Smallcap index ended with a nominal gain of 0.06%.

The overall market capitalisation of BSE-listed firms dropped to nearly Rs 434.1 lakh crore from nearly Rs 435.7 lakh crore in the previous session.

On Nifty 50, Bharti Airtel (1.64%), LTIMindtree (1.38%) and Hindalco (1.11%) ended as the top gainers while the UltraTech Cement (2.42%), Adani Enterprises (2.04%) and Larsen & Toubro (1.96%) were the losers.

Among the sectors, Nifty Media (0.95%), IT (0.76%), Consumer Durables (0.75%) and Metal (0.40%) ended in the green.

While the Nifty FMCG (1.20%), PSU Bank (1.14%) and Oil & Gas (1.07%) were the losers. Nifty Bank index fell 0.24%, while the Private Bank index ended 0.15% lower.

Indian rupee ended 10 paise higher at 83.54 per dollar on Friday against Thursday’s close of 83.64.

After seven consecutive sessions of gains, shares of HDFC Bank declined on Friday.

HDFC Bank share price opened with a mild gain of about 0.21% at Rs 1,672.85 against its previous close of Rs 1,669.35 but soon fell about 1.6% to the level of Rs 1,643.15 on profit booking.

Shares of RailTel Corporation of India rallied over 12% to Rs 488 per share, nearing its 52-week high of Rs 491 apiece. The uptick comes after it bagged a work order from South Central Railway worth Rs 20.22 crore.

Further, the shares of Vodafone Idea gained around 4% after a report said the telecom service provider had completed its 5G rollout obligation in all circles.

The company has a 5G spectrum in 17 circles, and has completed the rollout obligation in both spectrum bands.

At the global front, the stock futures pointed to modest gains in Europe after chipmakers drove a rally in Asia and yet another record-breaking session in the US.

Futures contracts for the Euro Stoxx 50 climbed 0.2% as the MSCI Asia Pacific Index rose 1%, lifted by the tech-heavy markets of South Korea and Taiwan. S&P 500 futures were little changed.