Nifty, Sensex extend losses; Hindalco, Bharti, Hero gain

Moneycontrol Bureau

10:58 am Market Update: Benchmark indices extended losses with the Sensex falling 151.73 points to 25178.76 and the Nifty down 38.55 points to 7676.35.In sectoral performance as reflected by the respective indices, oil & gas (-0.8 percent), FMCG (-0.6 percent), consumer durables (-0.6 percent) and IT (-0.2 percent) were under pressure, while metals (1.0 percent), capital goods (0.6 percent) and auto (0.3 percent) gained.     

Key Asian markets were trading weak. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng was the biggest lower, down 117 points at 20549. Taiwan’s Taiwan Index was down 43 points at 8742, Japan’s Nikkei 225 was down 68 points at 16979, Korea’s KOSPI was down 6 points at 1990, and China’s Shanghai was down 9 points at 2990. Singapore was the only exception to the downtrend with the Straits Times up 2 points at 2882. 10:35 am Oil imports to drop: India will cut oil imports by 10 percent in next six years by raising domestic output, conserving fuel and shifting to alternate sources like natural gas, Oil Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said.

"Prime Minister Narendra Modi has set us a target of reducing oil import dependence by 10 percent by 2022. We are confident of achieving that in six years," he said at an event here.

Modi had set the target of reducing import dependence in March last year. He had sought the dependence to be cut to 66 percent from 77 percent dependence in 2013-14.

Import dependence has, however, risen since then to 78.5 percent in 2014-15 when India imported 189.4 million tonnes of crude oil for USD 112.7 billion. In February this had risen to 83.1 percent.

10:20 am Buzzing: Navin Fluorine International shares are locked at 20 percent upper circuit at Rs 1,697.25 on Wednesday after partnership with US company for refrigerant production technology. There were pending buy orders of 1,726 shares, with no sellers available on the BSE, at 10:13 hours IST.

Honeywell has entered into a supply agreement and technology license with India's speciality fluorochemicals manufacturer to produce Honeywell Solstice yf, an automobile (car) refrigerant with a global warming potential of lower than 1.

Honeywell will license its proprietary process technologies to produce the refrigerant to Navin Fluorine, which will manufacture Solstice yf in India exclusively for Honeywell. Small-scale production is expected to begin by end of 2016.Also read - Fed move, weak $ calm EMs; India lags Brazil on valuations: JPM

10:00 am Market Check

The market continued to be under pressure with the Sensex falling 66.91 points to 25263.58. The Nifty declined 14 points to 7700.90 while the BSE Midcap remained flat.

The market breadth was positive as about 1009 BSE shares advanced against 705 declining shares.

Hindalco Industries topped buying list on Sensex, up more than 3 percent followed by Bharti Airtel and Hero Motocorp with more than a percent gain while Reliance Industries, HDFC, HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank and Lupin declined 0.6-1 percent.

Oil prices fell after figures from an industry group showed US crude stockpiles rose last week more than expected, reinforcing concerns that supply continues to exceed demand. The front-month contract in US crude futures was down 46 cents at USD 40.99 a barrel. The contract has rebounded 58 percent since hitting its lowest level since 2003 in February.

Brent crude was 38 cents lower at USD 41.41, reversing gains in the previous session when it finished at USD 41.79. Brent has surged 53 percent since hitting a multi-year low in January of USD 27.10 a barrel.