Nifty slips below 8,100; ICICI Bank, ITC top losers

Benchmark shares indices extended losses in late morning trade as heavy selling by foreign funds weighed on market sentiment.

At 11:30AM, the 30-share Sensex was down 152 points at 26,835 and the 50-share Nifty was down 40 points at 8,087.

The Indian rupee was trading higher at Rs 63.43 to the US dollar compared to the previous close of Rs 63.57.

Foreign institutional investors were net sellers to the tune of Rs 1,571 crore on Tuesday, as per provisional stock exchange data.

BSE Metal index was the top loser down 1.6% followed by Bankex, Healthcare, Auto and FMCG indices among others.

ICICI Bank was down 2.6% while ITC, Tata Motors, GAIL and Tata Steel were among the top losers.

However, Hindustan Unilever was up nearly 3%, extending its previous day’s gain on NSE, on reports that a foreign investment bank upgraded the stock to buy from hold and also raised its target price for the stock.

Infosys was up 0.4% ahead of its third quarter earnings on Friday.

Oil shares rebounded after sharp losses in the previous sessions tracking decline in global crude oil prices. Reliance Industries and ONGC were up over 1% each.

Among other shares, Tech Mahindra has gained more than 1% to Rs 2,561 on the BSE after the company entered into a joint venture with US-based global telecom technology firm Avion Systems to provide network design and engineering services to communications service providers.

Shares of Cox & Kings were up over 2% at Rs 303 after the company said it has alloted warrants to promoters at a premium to Tuesday's close of Rs 296.95 per share.

In the broader market, the BSE Mid-cap and Small-cap indices were down 0.4% each.

Market breadth remained weak with 1,510 gainers and 901 losers on the BSE.