Sensex slips 19 pts in late morning trade

The benchmark Sensex pared its initial gains, slipping 18.78 points to 27,269.39 in late morning deals following profit-booking in key index heavyweights in energy, oil and gas, metal, power utilities and telecom sectors amid mixed Asian cues.
Earlier resuming positive on consensus over GST and macro-data, as well as better corporate earning, sentiment also weighed by cut in India's growth forecast by the International Monetary Fund, which reduced the country's economic growth forecast for this year by as much as one percentage point to 6.6 per cent.
Index major RIL, which yesterday announced its third quarter net profit a rise of 3.6 per cent to Rs 7,506 crore, fell sharply by 2.83 per cent.

Gains were witnessed in consumer durables, capital goods, realty, IT and teck counters.
The Sensex opened higher at 27,331.82 and hovered between 27,381.43 and 27,231.66. It was quoting at 27,269.39 At 1100 hours, a loss of 18.78 points, or 0.07 per cent.
The NSE 50-share Nifty was also down marginally by 4.25 points, or 0.05 per cent, at 8,408.55 at 1100 hours.

Among the major losers were Reliance 2.83 per cent, Adani Ports 1.30 per cent, HDFC 0.96 per cent, Lupin 0.96 per cent and Tata Steel 0.96 per cent.
Major gainers included HUL (1.66 per cent), Asian Paints (1.20 per cent), Axis Bank (0.96 per cent) and SunPharma (0.88 per cent).

Foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) sold shares worth a net of Rs 347.25 crore yesterday, as per provisional data released by the stock exchanges.
Overseas, Asian stocks were mixed as the US financial markets remained closed yesterday for Martin Luther King Jr. Day crimping market activity.