Sensex, Nifty trade sideways; telecom stocks advance

The key equity indices continued to trade sideways in mid morning trade. The Nifty managed to hold above the 18,400 mark. Telecom stocks edged higher. Asian market, however, continued to trade mixed.

At 11:27 IST, the barometer index, the S&P BSE Sensex, was up 32.79 points or 0.05% to 61,748.84. The Nifty 50 index was down 5 points or 0.03% to 18,413.75.

In the broader market, the S&P BSE Mid-Cap index lost 0.63% while the S&P BSE Small-Cap index declined 1.06%.

The market breadth, indicating the overall health of the market, was weak. On the BSE, 1089 shares rose and 2003 shares fell. A total of 147 shares were unchanged.

Buzzing Index:

The S&P BSE Telecom index rose 3.04% to 1,799.28. The index fell 1.09% in the past three sessions.

Vodafone Idea (up 4.70%), Bharti Airtel (up 4.19%), Indus Towers (up 3.41%), GTPL Hathway (up 2.85%), ITI (up 2.61%) and Sterlite Technologies (up 2.55%) advanced.

Concurrently, Tata Teleservices (down 4.95%), Railtel (down 3.02%), HFCL (down 2.52%), Tata Communications (down 2.06%), MTNL (down 1.86%) and Tejas Networks (down 1.75%) declined.

Stocks in Spotlight:

Nelco was locked in a lower circuit of 5% at Rs 911.25. The company's consolidated net profit soared 53.15% to Rs 3.40 crore on a 13.52% surge in total income to Rs 61.46 crore in Q2 FY22 over Q2 FY21.

ICICI Securities added 0.51% to Rs 824.70. The brokerage company posted a 26.3% increase in consolidated net profit to Rs 351.24 crore on a 26% rise in revenue to Rs 857 crore in Q2 FY22 over Q2 FY21.

The stock broking company's profit before tax stood at Rs 470.92 crore in Q2 FY22, 26.5% higher than Rs 372.30 crore reported in Q2 FY21, on account of growth in revenue and improvement in margins. The company said it added over 5.8 lakh clients and reported its highest ever quarterly addition.

Jindal Saw shed 0.17% to Rs 118.45. The company has won contract for repair and maintenance of manufacturing facilities of Sathavahana Ispat.

Global markets:

Asian stocks were mixed on Wednesday as China kept its benchmark lending rate unchanged. China on Wednesday kept the one-year loan prime rate (LPR) unchanged at 3.85% while the five-year LPR was also held steady at 4.65%.

U.S. stocks climbed on Tuesday as major companies continued to report strong third-quarter earnings, easing concerns that persistent Covid cases and rising costs would derail corporate America's profit recovery.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) on Tuesday downgraded its 2021 economic growth forecast for Asia after the highly infectious Covid-19 delta variant caused a spike in cases in parts of the region. The IMF said it expects Asia's economy to grow by 6.5% in 2021, compared with its April forecast for a 7.6% expansion. The region's growth will be led by China and India, the fund added.

The IMF expects China to grow 8% this year and India by 9.5% in the fiscal year that ends next March.

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