Sensex slips for 4th straight day; HDFC dips 4%, L&T up 2%

Moneycontrol Bureau

The market continued drifting lower for the fourth consecutive session on Friday, losing 157 points on the Sensex on weak global cues.

Apart from profit booking, Fed tapering fears also hit the sentiment today across the globe, feel experts.

Andrew Holland, CEO, Ambit Investment Advisors Private is cautious on the Indian market with a short-term perspective, but believes that market will not fall significantly from hereon. He expects the Nifty to find support at 6000 level.

According to him, most of the pre-election rally has already played out.

He further added that the US and Europe are now showing reasonable signs of recovery and the Fed is likely to taper QE by December-January.

The Sensex closed at 20,666.15 while the Nifty rose 46.50 points to 6,140.75. For the week, both benchmarks lost 2.6 percent each.

Financials, oil & gas, FMCG and auto stocks were under pressure while capital goods, power and Tata pack saw buying interest.

HDFC was the big biggest loser in the Sensex, falling nearly 4 percent followed by HDFC Bank, ONGC, Bajaj Auto, M&M and Maruti Suzuki with 2 percent loss.

Punjab National Bank dropped more than 4 percent after dismal performance in second quarter earnings. Net profit fell 52.6 percent year-on-year to Rs 505.5 crore, dented by higher provisions on depreciation in investment.

Indian Bank and City Union Bank lost 3.6 percent and 2.5 percent, respectively as asset quality worsened during September quarter while UCO Bank surged over 5 percent after its second quarter profit spiked four-fold on strong retail banking revenues.

Tata Steel gained nearly 3 percent ahead of earnings next week while Tata Motors, which announced its quarterly results after market hours, gained 1.3 percent.

India's largest commercial vehicle manufacturer Tata Motors surprised Dalal Street on every parameter with the second quarter consolidated net profit surging nearly 71 percent year-on-year on Jaguar Land Rover boost, but standalone (domestic) business continued posting losses amid weak economic environment.

The bigger positive factor was the JLR margin that expanded 300 basis points - far better than analysts’ expectations to 17.8 percent in the quarter gone by.

Meanwhile, the rupee closed at 62.47 per dollar - lowest level since September 30, down 6 paise from previous close.

Globally, Asian and European markets saw sell-off ahead of US non-farm payrolls data today. Shanghai, Nikkei and Kospi lost 1 percent while Hang Seng declined 0.6 percent. European markets (at 17:33 hours IST) fell between 0.5-1 percent.