Breadth remains weak; Nifty holds 17,000 mark

Key domestic equity benchmarks continued trading with steep losses in afternoon trade. All the sectoral indices on the NSE were in the red. Banks and metal shares were under pressure.

At 13:25 IST, the barometer index, the S&P BSE Sensex, was down 1,141.04 points or 1.96% to 57,011.88. The Nifty 50 index lost 343.55 points or 1.98% to 17,031.20.

In the broader market, the S&P BSE Mid-Cap index fell 2.19% while the S&P BSE Small-Cap index slipped 2.57%.

The market breadth was weak. On the BSE, 679 shares rose and 2790 shares fell. A total of 123 shares were unchanged.

The sentiment was impacted by negative global cues and geopolitical worries. Asian stocks tumbled after the White House warned of a possible imminent Russian invasion of Ukraine. Crude oil prices spiked to 7-year highs due to the Ukraine crisis. In the commodities market, Brent crude for April 2022 settlement was above $95 a barrel mark.

JSW Steel (down 6.07%), HDFC Life Insurance (down 5.05%), Maruti Suzuki India (down 4.10%), HDFC (down 4.02%) and Tata Steel (down 3.78%) were major Nifty losers.

TCS (up 0.95%), ONGC (up 0.30%) and Sun Pharmaceutical Industries (up 0.03%) were top Nifty gainers.

Economy:

India's inflation based on wholesale price index (WPI) stood at 12.96% in January 2022 compared with 2.51% in January 2021.

"The high rate of inflation in January, 2022 is primarily due to rise in prices of mineral oils, crude petroleum & natural gas, basic metals, chemicals and chemical products, food articles etc as compared the corresponding month of the previous year," the Ministry of Commerce & Industry said in a statement today.

WPI grew 13.56% in December 2021, while the figure for November 2021 was 14.87%.

Meanwhile, India's Industrial output slumped to a 10-month low of 0.4% in December 2021, dragged down by manufacturing, capital goods and consumer durables output along with an unfavourable base, according to data released on Friday by the National Statistical Office (NSO). The IIP had registered a growth of 1.3% a month ago and 2.2% in December 2020.

LIC IPO:

Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC) has filed its draft share sale prospectus with the capital markets regulator SEBI, paving the way for India's largest initial public offering (IPO). LIC plans to sell 31.62 crore shares, which is about 5% of its total equity base.

The IPO issue is expected to be the country's largest public issue and will hit the capital market in March 2022. The IPO is 100% offer for sale by Government of India and there will be no fresh issue of shares by LIC.

LIC has 66% market share in New Business Premiums with 283 million policies and 1.35 million agents as of 31st March last year. As of September 2021, its assets under management (AUM) stood at Rs 39.6 lakh crore. The embedded value of LIC as of 30 September 2021, stood at Rs 5,39,686 crore.

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