Sensex drops 45 points in late morning deals

The benchmark BSE Sensex slipped from its early gains and was trading lower by 45 points on profit- booking in blue-chips of realty, oil&gas, metal, bank, healthcare and teck sectors despite firm Asian cues.
The 30-share BSE index had opened in the positive by 147 points on better blue-chip earnings numbers and unexpected Chinese interest rate cut on Friday.
Caution, however, prevailed ahead of a key two-day US Federal Reserve Meeting, which is scheduled to start from tomorrow and domestic Expiry derivative series for the month of October on Thursday.
Shares of mid-cap and small-cap companies also witnessed selling pressure, while auto and capital goods sectors saw some buying interest.

The 30-share index resumed higher at 27,575.04 and hovered in a range of 27,618.14 to 27,423.10 before quoting 27,425.60 at 1110 hours a loss of 45.21 points or 0.16 per cent.
The 50-share Nifty was also trading lower at 20.65 points or 0.25 per cent to 8,274.80 at 1110 hours.

Major losers were Bharti Airtel 2.16 per cent, Coal India 1.86 per cent, Reliance Industries 0.96 per cent, TCS 0.68 per cent, HDFC Bank 0.60 per cent and ICICI Bank 0.56 per cent.
Notable gainers were BHEL 2.79 per cent, Bajaj Auto 1.97 per cent, Vedanta 1.71 per cent, Maruti Suzuki 1.38 per cent, Hero MotoCorp 1.04 per cent and L&T 1.01 per cent.

Meanwhile, a provisional data showed that foreign portfolio investors bought shares worth Rs 229.18 crore on Friday.
Overseas, Asian markets were trading higher after China unexpectedly cut interest rates and lenders' reserve requirements to support its ailing economy.
Stocks of Singapore, Indonesia, Japan, China, Hong Kong and South Korea were trading higher between 0.91 per cent and 0.12 per cent.