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The Sensex and Nifty ended flat on Thursday, shrugging off weaker-than-expected economic growth data as investors bet the economy would improve starting this quarter, while caution prevailed ahead of the central bank's policy decision next week.
Trading sentiment was hit as participants trimmed their positions, triggered by manufacturing sector growth, lower GDP numbers and core industries growth.
Manufacturing sector growth in the country moderated to a three-month low in May amid softer rise in new orders and production,
The 30-share BSE index Sensex closed down 8.21 points or 0.03 per cent at 31,137.59 and the 50-share NSE index Nifty ended lower 5.15 points or 0.05 per cent at 9,616.10.
Among BSE sectoral indices, FMCG index was the star-performer and was up 1.18 per cent, followed by healthcare 1.17 per cent, capital goods 0.92 per cent and infrastructure 0.67 per cent. On the other hand, oil & gas index fell the most by 1.58 per cent, metal 1.12 per cent, PSU 0.66 per cent and banking 0.48 per cent.
Top five Sensex gainers were Adani Ports (+3.2%), HUL (+2.68%), L&T (+1.82%), Sun Pharma (+1.42%) and ITC (+0.87%), while the major losers were ICICI Bank (-1.92%), ONGC (-1.81%), GAIL (-1.77%), Tata Steel (-1.39%) and Bharti Airtel (-1.25%).
Trading sentiment suffered a setback after macroeconomic indicators such as GDP numbers and core sector growth showed that the country’s economic growth has slowed down.
India’s economic growth slowed to 7.1 per cent in 2016-17, the year in which 87 per cent of the currency was demonetised, despite a very good showing by the agricultural sector.
The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) was 6.1 per in the January-March quarter, the immediate three months after the demonetisation was affected on November 9, 2016.
The growth of eight core sectors declined to 2.5 per cent in April, mainly due to lower coal, crude oil and cement productions, too dampened trading sentiment.
Early trade
The Sensex , which had lost 13.60 points in the previous session, fell by another 75.33 points or 0.24 per cent to 31,070.47.
The Nifty also fell 22.80 points or 0.23 per cent to 9,598.45.
Shares of state-run oil marketing companies such as BPCL, HPCL and IOC were trading in negative zone with losses up to 1.97 per cent despite a hike in petrol and diesel prices.
Meanwhile, foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) bought shares worth Rs 1,048.93 crore, while domestic institutional investors (DIIs) sold shares worth a net Rs 939.54 crore yesterday, as per provisional data.
Asian shares
Sterling retreated on Thursday on fears that Prime Minister Theresa May could lose control of parliament in Britain's June 8 election, while conflicting signals on the health of China's manufacturing sector kept most Asian stock markets in check.
Sterling retreated 0.1 per cent to $1.2877 after a YouGov poll showed May could be well short of the number of seats needed to form a government, raising the prospect of political turmoil just as formal Brexit talks begin.
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