Equities edge lower, Titan top drag but pharma stocks gain

Equity indices pulled back during early hours on Wednesday in line with Asian peers as investors awaited fresh developments on the outcome of US-China trade talks.

At 10:15 am, the BSE S & P Sensex was down by 186 points at 40,062 while the Nifty 50 edged lower by 58 points to 11,859.

Sectoral indices at the National Stock Exchange were mixed with Nifty realty gaining 2.4 points and pharma by 1.4 points. Nifty auto lost by 0.5 per cent and private bank by 0.4 per cent.

Among stocks, Titan tumbled by 7.8 per cent to Rs 1,182.85 per share. Bharti Infratel, Bharti Airtel, HCL Technologies and Axis Bank too were in the red.

Among the gainers were pharma majors like Cipla, Dr Reddy's and Sun Pharma besides Yes Bank, Mahindra & Mahindra, Tech Mahindra, Coal India and Bharat Petroleum Corporation.

Meanwhile, Asian shares were little changed as investors awaited new developments toward scaling back a protracted trade war between the United States and China.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia Pacific shares outside Japan was unchanged while Japan's Nikkei stock index rose by 0.35 per cent. Hong Kong's Hang Seng was down by 0.08 per cent and South Korea's Kospi by 0.02 per cent.

.