Weak trades continue

IT, FMCG buck trends

markets continued to trade in the red with selling pressure noticable in auto and realty shares. The Sensex, mirroring cues from global bourses, slipped into the negative zone and is now down 110 points at 19,916. Nifty is down 35 points at 6,019.

Asia stocks traded mostly lower in lackluster session Thursday amid some gloom over Apple Inc.’s latest earnings and forecast, although Japanese shares found fresh impetus from a weaker yen. Nikkei is up 1.2% at 10,619. Taiwan Weighted and Kospi are down over half a per cent each.

From the sectoral pack, most of the indices have already fallen into the negative zone. BSE realty index is down 3.4% ahead of next week's monetary policy review. Other rate sensitive sector - auto index is down 3% at 10,763. On the other hand, BSE FMCG index has gained 0.7% at 5,764. IT index is managing to hold on to gains so far.

Capital goods stocks declined on profit booking. L&T fell 2% at Rs 1529 ahead of its Q3 results today.

Tata Motors slumped after Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) on Wednesday said it is likely to report a lower earnings before interest, taxation, depreciation and amortisation (Ebitda) margin in the October-December quarter compared with the previous two quarters due to exchange rate fluctuations and a higher mix of Evoque sales. The stock was the top dragger - down 7.4% at Rs 289.

GAIL, Mahindra & Mahindr a and Sterlite were among the other key losers. Reliance was down 1% at Rs 913.

Meanwhile, ONGC has bucked trends and is up 1.7% at Rs 339. TCS abd Wipro from the IT space are up 1.2% each, while Infosys is up marginally at Rs 2,804.  FMCG majors - HUL and ITC are up over 1% each.

BSE market breadth is negative. Out of 2,510 stocks traded, 1,821 shares declined while 592 shares advanced in morning deals.