The stock markets continued losing ground in afternoon trade on profit booking as rate sensitives and IT stocks fell swiftly dragging down the benchmark indices.
At 12:57 p.m., the 30-share BSE Sensex was down 114.43 points, or 0.59 per cent, at 19,292.42, while the 50-share NSE Nifty traded 47 points, or 0.79 per cent, lower at 5,869.30.
Rate-sensitives, which had been rallying on hopes of a rate cut at the RBI's policy review meet on May 3, and IT stocks were the key laggards. Both the BSE Bankex and BSE IT indices were down 1 per cent in afternoon trade. None of BSE's sectoral indices traded in the green.
Jindal Steel & Power was the top loser on the Sensex, falling nearly 3 per cent to hit a 52-week low of Rs 318.50 as the company's consolidated net profit fell by nearly 35 per cent for the quarter ended March 31.
Kotak Institutional Equities said the company's March-quarter performance was difficult to explain as its steel realization declined by Rs 3,000 per ton at a time when the price decline in the market was Rs 500 per ton. "This inexplicable performance would require clarification from the management," Kotak said in a report.
The Jet Airways stock, which rose as much as 20 per cent after the airline announced its decision to sell a minority stake to Abu Dhabi-based Etihad Airways for Rs. 2,060 crore, corrected today falling 2.33 per cent.
Maruti Suzuki traded 0.5 per cent lower ahead of its fourth quarter results announcement today. India's largest carmaker is expected to report a 13.1 per cent year on year increase in net profit at Rs. 722.75 crore. Sales are expected to rise 5.7 per cent to Rs. 12,402.50 crore.
The company said on Wednesday that it will consider amalgamating seven wholly-owned subsidiaries with itself at its upcoming board meeting.
M&M (2.42 per cent), Tata Consultancy Services (2.02 per cent), Reliance Industries (1.92 per cent), HUL (1.79 per cent) and Hero Motocorp (1.73 per cent) were the other significant losers on the BSE benchmark index.
Bharti Airtel, which is slated to report its Q4 results on May 2, led the gainers on the Sensex, jumping 4.7 per cent on hopes of better-than-expected earnings for January-March, taking cues from Idea Cellular which beat March quarter earnings estimates. Shares in Idea too were 6.8 per cent up in afternoon trade after surging 10 per cent earlier.
Bajaj Auto (2.13 per cent), HDFC (1.74 per cent), and GAIL (1.51 per cent) were the other key gainers on the index.
With inputs from Agencies
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