Rate sensitive stocks fall as RBI maintains status quo

Bank, realty and auto stocks today fell as much as 3 per cent after the Reserve Bank surprisingly kept short-term lending rate unchanged at 6.25 per cent.
Shares of Bank of Baroda plunged 2.71 per cent to settle at Rs 157.85, followed by PNB with a fall of 1.94 per cent to Rs 131.70 and SBI 1.47 per cent to Rs 255.35 on the BSE.
Other laggards were: ICICI Bank 1.05 per cent, Federal Bank 0.29 per cent and Yes Bank 0.28 per cent.
Accordingly, the BSE bank index settled at 20,849.49, down 1.07 per cent.
Among realty scrips, NBCC closed for the day at Rs 231.85, down 1.05 per cent, and Unitech at Rs 4.70, unchanged from the previous closing price. However, Oberoi Realty settled in the positive territory at Rs 301.45, up 1.91 per cent.

The realty index ended the day at 1260.43 points, registering a decline of 1.49 per cent.

From auto space, shares of Bajaj Auto dipped 0.76 per cent to Rs 2707.30, while, Tata Motors and Hero MotoCorp defied the broader market trend and settled in green. At the end of today's trade Tata Motors was at Rs 445.25, up 0.88 per cent, while Hero MotoCorp was at Rs 3240.00, up 1.31 per cent. Accordingly the auto index was quoted at 20030.92, registering a marginal rise of 0.42 per cent.
Brokers said RBI's surprise decision to keep key interest rate unchanged and lowering GDP growth rate to 7.1 per cent, triggered across-the-board selling.

RBI Governor Urjit Patel kept the key policy rates unchanged even as the central bank lowered GDP growth rate and short term disruption in economic activities due to demonetisation.
The central bank left the short-term lending rate or repo rate unchanged at 6.25 per cent, and the cash reserve requirement at 4 per cent. The RBI also lowered the growth estimate at 7.1 per cent for 2016-17 from earlier projection of 7.6 per cent.