Equity indices dip on COVID worries, banking stocks suffer
Mumbai: Equity benchmark indices were on a downswing during early hours on Monday amid worries over rapidly increasing Covid-19 cases in the country.
At 10:15 am, the BSE S&P Sensex was down by 1,046 points or 2.09 percent at 49,984 while the Nifty 50 edged lower by 249 points or 1.67 percent to 14,618. Except for Nifty IT which jumped by 1.8 percent, all other sectoral indices at the National Stock Exchange were in the red with Nifty private bank down by 2 percent, PSU bank and financial service by 1.9 percent each, realty by 1.4 percent, and auto by 0.8 percent.
Among stocks, IndusInd Bank lost by 3.6 percent to Rs 962.05 per share while Axis Bank was down by 2.4 percent and ICICI Bank by 2.2 percent. State Bank of India fell by 2.3 percent, Bajaj Finance by 3.6 percent, and Bajaj Finserv by 2 percent. Home loan lender dropped by 2.3 percent to Rs 2,472.90 per unit. However, IT software major Infosys was up by 2.5 percent, Wipro by 2.2 percent, and HCL Technologies by 2 percent. Wipro, Britannia, JSW Steel, and Cipla too traded with a positive bias.
Meanwhile, Asian stock prices rose to a one-and-a-half month high after data showing a surge in US employment while US bonds came under pressure on worries the Federal Reserve may bump up interest rates sooner than it has indicated. Japan's Nikkei rose by 0.8 percent while MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was almost flat. The US labor department said on Friday that non-farm payrolls surged by 916,000 jobs last month, the biggest gain since last August.
