Sensex, Nifty open on choppy note on weak global cues

Mumbai, August 17 dmanewsdesk:  Equity benchmarks Sensex and Nifty opened on a choppy note on Tuesday, tracking weak cues from global markets.

After dropping over 100 points in the opening session, the 30-share index turned positive to trade 64.21 points or 0.12 per cent higher at 55,646.79, while the broader NSE Nifty advanced 14.95 points or 0.09 per cent to 16,578.

Tech Mahindra was the top gainer in the Sensex pack, rising over 3 per cent, followed by Asian Paints, Sun Pharma and Nestle India.

On the other hand, IndusInd Bank, HDFC Bank, Maruti and ICICI Bank were among the laggards.

In the previous session, Sensex ended 145.29 points or 0.26 per cent higher at a new peak of 55,582.58, and Nifty advanced 33.95 points or 0.21 per cent to a fresh high of 16,563.05.

Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) were net sellers in the capital market as they offloaded shares worth Rs 1,088.32 crore on Monday, as per provisional exchange data.

According to V K Vijayakumar, Chief Investment Strategist at Geojit Financial Services, the market is slowly moving into a consolidation phase with strong support coming from largecaps. The current trend of largecap outperformance is likely to continue in the very short term.

“Presently, there are no major global cues that can sway the market trend. But domestic cues like the sustained decline in COVID cases and economic activity returning back to normal are positives,” he noted.

Elsewhere in Asia, bourses in Shanghai, Hong Kong and Seoul were trading with losses in mid-session deals, while Tokyo was positive.

Equities in the US largely ended on a positive note in overnight trade.

Meanwhile, international oil benchmark Brent crude rose 0.03 per cent to USD 69.53 per barrel.

Source: PTI