Key domestic indices continued trading with small losses in mid-morning trade. At 11:21 IST, the barometer index, the S&P BSE Sensex, was down 73.08 points or 0.19% at 37,952.37. The Nifty 50 index was down 9.75 points or 0.09% at 11,190.25.
The broader market traded firm. The S&P BSE Mid-Cap index was up 1.03% while the S&P BSE Small-Cap index rose 0.88%.
The market breadth is strong. On the BSE, 1513 shares rose and 822 shares fell. A total of 119 shares were unchanged.
Foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) bought shares worth Rs 637.43 crore, while domestic institutional investors (DIIs), were net sellers to the tune of Rs 468 crore in the Indian equity market on 6 August, provisional data showed.
COVID-19 Update:
Total COVID-19 confirmed cases worldwide stood at 19,025,580 with 713,845 deaths. India reported 6,07,384 active cases of COVID-19 infection and 41,585 deaths while 13,78,105 patients have been discharged, according to the data from the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India.
Buzzing Index:
The Nifty Metal index gained 0.41% to 2305. The index has added nearly 8% in six days.
Hindustan Zinc (up 3.17%), Vedanta (up 1.76%), Steel Authority of India (up 1.33%), Ratnamani Metals (up 1.15%), NMDC (up 0.86%) and Jindal Steel & Power (up 0.84%) were the top gainers. Among the other gainers were Coal India (up 0.7%), Tata Steel (up 0.67%) and National Aluminium Company (up 0.57%).
Earnings Impact:
Adani Enterprises slipped 0.4% after consolidated net loss stood at Rs 148.65 crore in Q1 June 2020 compared with net profit of Rs 498.67 crore in Q1 June 2019. Consolidated net sales tanked 50.1% to Rs 5,265.19 crore in Q1 June 2020 as against Rs 10,561.37 crore in Q1 June 2019. Volumes across the segments were impacted owing to lower power demand and logistics issues due to COVID-19 pandemic. EBIDTA for the quarter dropped 66.40% to Rs 301 crore in Q1 FY21 from Rs 896 crore in Q1 FY20. With continued lockdown and restrictions during this quarter, Adani Enterprises' volumes across business segments have been affected. The company resumed its operations following government guidelines. The operational performance of the businesses continue to recover in phased manner towards pre COVID-19 level.
Bayer CropScience surged 10.41% after the company's net profit jumped 86% to Rs 251.70 crore on 29.2% rise in revenue from operations to Rs 1227.80 crore in Q1 FY21 over Q1 FY20. Profit before tax in Q1 June 2020 stood at Rs 312.60 crore, up by 75.9% from Rs 177.70 crore in Q1 June 2019. Sharing an outlook for the future, D. Narain, said, "COVID-19 has significantly disrupted Indian agriculture and forced players across the agri value chain to remodel their day-to-day operations and supply chains. It has also highlighted the importance of agriculture for food security, advancing rural livelihoods and the Indian economy. The government's transformational agri-reforms will provide farmers wider access to sell their produce beyond their local marketplaces and achieve better price realization. Bayer will continue to support Indian farmers through access to seeds & crop protection inputs, product innovation and crop advisory. Our focus will be on new business models and value chain collaborations to expand the reach of our agri-solutions, support scale-up of FPOs (Farmer Producer Organizations) and digital farming solutions."
Global Markets:
Asian stocks were trading lower Friday as investors await several economic data releases for July.
In US, shares on Wall Street shrugged off a sluggish start and closed higher on Thursday, with the Nasdaq ending the session above 11,000 for the first time as investors hoped for a new fiscal stimulus package.
Investors remain hopeful that lawmakers can strike a deal on a fresh round of coronavirus relief for those Americans out of work, while both Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said they remained optimistic on an agreement.
Meanwhile, investors took heart after the number of Americans filing for jobless benefits for the week ended Aug. 1 fell to a three-week low of 1.186 million, a decline of 249,000 from the previous week's reading of 1.435 million. The number of people receiving traditional jobless benefits through the states, known as continuing claims, dropped by a seasonally adjusted 844,000 to 16.1 million in the week ended July 25.
US President Donald Trump said on Thursday it was possible the United States would have a coronavirus vaccine before the November election, a far more optimistic forecast than timing put forth by White House health experts.
Meanwhile, signs of growing China-U.S. tensions were evident as Secretary of State Mike Pompeo reportedly asked American companies to consider withholding their apps from phones made by China's Huawei Technologies. Those comments come as the U.S. has threatened to ban China-owned entertainment applications TikTok unless Microsoft Corp. can strike a deal to buy all or part of the company from ByteDance.
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