By Bharath Rajeswaran
BENGALURU (Reuters) -Indian shares fell in morning trading on Friday, retreating from all-time highs after a sharp rally in the previous session and as consumer stocks took a breather.
The Nifty 50 was down 0.22% at 25,333.7 points as of 10:18 a.m. IST, while the Sensex shed 0.21% to 82,793.93. They opened about 0.15% higher, before reversing.
“All the liquidity, like we saw earlier this week with rising mutual fund inflows into equities and the rush for Bajaj Housing Finance IPO, will find its place in the markets, keeping them buoyant,” said Aishvarya Dadheech, founder and chief investment officer of Fident Asset Management.
“But the scope for further upside is crucially linked to the resilience of domestic earnings and whether U.S. economy sees a soft landing or not, given the rate cut is imminent.”
The local stock market rallied sharply late on Thursday after a report said China could cut mortgage rates to boost consumption. That lifted commodity stocks.
Metals jumped nearly 3% on Thursday and were up 1.5% on the day on expectations of China stimulus. [MET/L]
But, overall, seven of the 13 sectors logged losses.
Consumer stocks shed 0.8%, taking a breather from a 15% rally since July on expectations of demand revival and volume growth due to steady monsoon. The index hit record highs in the last four sessions.
The broader, more domestically focussed small- and mid-caps gained about 0.6% each.
Among individual stocks, Bharti Hexacomm surged 9.5% after Jefferies upgraded the stock to “buy” and said it was the best play on tariff hikes in the telecom sector.
Patanjali Foods fell 3% on a report of its top shareholders selling a stake. ($1 = 83.9460 Indian rupees)
(Reporting by Bharath Rajeswaran in Bengaluru; Editing by Sherry Jacob-Phillips, Sonia Cheema and Savio D’Souza)
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