Equities on downward swing, Reliance cracks by 1.8%

New Delhi: Equity benchmark indices closed marginally lower on Friday in line with Asian peers following a record contraction in economic data from the United States.

The BSE S&P Sensex was down by 129 points or 0.34 per cent at 37,607 while the Nifty 50 slipped by 29 points or 0.26 per cent at 11,073. Sectoral indices at the National Stock Exchange were mixed with Nifty pharma gaining by 3.5 per cent and PSU bank by 1.4 per cent. But Nifty financial service, private bank and auto were in the red.

Among stocks, Reliance Industries lost by 1.84 per cent to Rs 2,070 per share on profit-booking, a day after it reported over 30 per cent jump in Q1 net profit at Rs 13,248 crore.

Eicher Motors slipped by 2.7 per cent, Bajaj Auto by 1.6 per cent and Hero MotoCorp by 1.2 per cent. HDFC Bank, HDFC and HDFC Life lost by 1.6 per cent, 1.3 per cent and 1.2 per cent respectively.

The other prominent losers were Kotak Mahindra Bank, Wipro and Asian Paints.

However, Sun Pharma moved up 5.4 per cent to close at Rs 537.80 per share while Cipla witnessed a gain of Rs 5.1 per cent. JSW Steel, State Bank of India, Axis Bank, HCL Technologies and Tata Motors too traded in the green.
Meanwhile, Asian shares slid as abysmal economic data from the United States and rising global COVID-19 cases weighed on sentiment.

US GDP collapsed at a 32.9 per cent annualised rate in the second quarter, the deepest decline on record, while jobless claims rose last week.

Japan’s Nikkei dropped by 2.82 per cent, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng by 0.47 per cent and Seoul’s Kospi by 0.78 per cent. (ANI)