Nifty holds 7,400 amid weak trades; Bajaj Auto dips 2%

Financials were among the top losers along with Sun Pharma and index heavyweight Reliance Industries

Benchmark share indices continued to trade lower in noon deals tracking weakness in their Asian peers and caution ahead of the outcome of the US Federal Reserve's two-day policy meet which ends later today. Further, institutional selling further dampened sentiment.

At 1:05pm, the S&P BSE Sensex was down 136 points at 24,415 and the Nifty50 fell 35 points at 7,426.

Read more from our special coverage on "NIFTY"

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• Markets trim gains; Economic Survey in focus
• Nifty hits fresh 21-month low ahead of Budget
• Nifty slips 91 points ahead of February F&O expiry, Rail Budget

The broader markets underperformed the benchmark indices with both the BSE Midcap and Smallcap indices down over 1% each. Market breadth was weak with 1550 losers and 739 gainers on the BSE.

Foreign institutional investors turned net sellers on Tuesday with equity sales worth Rs 54 crore while domestic institutional investors were net sellers in equities worth Rs 302 crore, as per provisional stock exchange data.

Further, the market regulator on Tuesday permitted foreign portfolio investment (FPIs) in real estate investment trusts (Reits), infrastructure investment trusts (InvITs) and alternative investment funds (AIFs). The regulator also allowed FPI to acquire bonds under default.

SECTORS & STOCKS

Bank shares were trading lower post their advance tax numbers. SBI was down 1.5% after it paid advance tax for Jan-March 2016 quarter at Rs 690 crore compared with Rs 1,749 crore in the same quarter last fiscal. ICICI Bank was down 0.8%. The private sector lender paid marginally higher advance tax of Rs 1,300 crore compared with Rs 1,295 crore last year. HDFC was down 0.4%. The bank paid a higher advance tax of Rs 1,600 crore against Rs 1,400 crore paid in Jan-Mar 2015.

Cairn India was down 1.1% after its parent UK’s Cairn Energy Plc on Tuesday said it has been served a tax assessment notice of Rs.28,200 crore by the income tax department for recovering alleged dues from an internal re-organization of the company’s Indian assets in 2006.

Bajaj Auto was down 2.5% on the BSE as the stock turned ex-dividend today, for an interim dividend of Rs 50 per share.

However, index heavyweights ITC and Reliance Industries were up 0.7%-0.8% each.

Realty stocks pared early gains and were trading lower. The Lok Sabha yesterday approved the Real Estate (Regulation and Development) Bill, 2016. HDIL, Unitech, DB Realty, Prestige Estates were down 2%-4% each.

Among others, shares of Alphageo (India) were up nearly 2% at Rs 586 on the Bombay Stock Exchange after the company said it has received an order from state-owned oil explorer Oil India.

Shares of fertiliser companies are trading mixed after the Ministry of Chemicals & Fertilizers on Tuesday made it mandatory for fertilizer companies to print the MRP and available subsidy on each bag of P&K fertilizers.