Nifty, Sensex start off with jitters; RIL, auto, pharma stocks arrest fall

The Nifty had snapped a 10-day losing run in the last session.

Indian benchmark indices extended their recovery and eked out marginal gains to open the session on March 6 on a positive note. However, profit booking soon kicked in, pulling the Nifty 50 and Sensex, marginally into the red. Despite that, solid gains in index heavyweight Reliance Industries, accompanied by upmoves in automobile and pharma stocks arrested any major fall for the benchmarks.

At 9.36 am, the Sensex was down 77.80 points or 0.11 percent at 73,652.43, and the Nifty was down 20.45 points or 0.09 percent at 22,316.85. Despite the flattish trend, the market breadth tilted heavily in favour of gainers as about 2,399 shares rose, 613 fell, and 128 remained unchanged.

In addition, upbeat cues from global markets after US President Donald Trump announced a one-month delay for tariffs on automakers fueled hopes that Trump could provide further exemptions, are also likely to lend support to the market.

Now while Trump's indication of negotiations might have eased investor sentiment a bit, VK Vijayakumar,  Chief Investment Strategist, Geojit Financial Services, still sees it with an uncertain outlook.

"We are in a highly uncertain and volatile situation for global trade, global economy and markets. The end game of Trump’s tariff policy is unclear. Trump’s latest declaration granting exemption from recently hiked tariffs to imports of Canadian and Mexican autos indicate that his intention is to negotiate from a position of strength. So deals and settlements are possible but they are not going to be smooth," he said.

On the technical front however,  Devarsh Vakil, Head of Prime Research at HDFC Securities sees resistances for the Nifty placed at 22,500 and 22,700. On the downside Vakil believes 22,173 and 22,000 could offer support to the Nifty. Taking a contrasting stance, however, he anticipates the market to remain buoyant due to short-covering, as investors, particularly foreign portfolio investors have substantial short positions in Indian stocks.

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Despite volatility in the benchmark indices, the broader market remained resilient. The BSE Smallcap index surged over 1 percent while the BSE Midcap was up 0.7 percent, outperforming their large-cap counterparts.

On the sectoral front, of the 13 major sectoral indices, Nifty Pharma, Nifty Metal, Nifty Media and Nifty Energy emerged as the top gainers, up around a percent each. Informtion technology stocks witnessed profit booking after strong gains in the last session, keeping the sectoral index flat. Banks also witnessed some selling pressure which pulled the Nifty Bank index into the red.

Among Nifty 50 constituents, Reliance Industries, Asian Paints, BPCL, Cipla and Shriram Finance were the biggest gainers, rising 1-2 percent. On the other hand, Trent, Bharti Airtel, HDFC Life and SBI Life were the worst hit, down 1-2 percent.

Among prominent stocks, shares of Reliance Industries as much as 2 percent after brokerage Kotak Institutional Equities upgraded the stock to a 'buy' following its recent correction. Reliance Industries shares have declined 27 percent from their recent peak of Rs 1,608. The subdued performance in recent times has been largely driven by weakness in the retail segment. However, Kotak Institutional Equities expects the ongoing store rationalisation cycle to conclude soon, potentially stabilising the business.

Oil prices also hit a six-month low, lifting sentiment for oil marketing companies and paint manufacturers amid hopes of easing input costs. This optimism lifted shares of Asian Paints and BPCL to the top spots in the list of gainers on the Nifty 50.

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