By Bharath Rajeswaran
(Reuters) -Indian bluechip indexes fell on Friday as worries about corporate earnings weighed on sentiment, with IT stocks the sole exception after comments from sector-leader TCS indicated early signs of a demand revival.
The Nifty 50 shed 0.62% to 23,375 points as of 10:08 a.m. IST, while the BSE Sensex was down 0.55% to 77,191.43.
Both the indexes opened about 0.2% higher, before reversing course in early trade.
Twelve of the 13 major sectors declined. The broader, more domestically focussed smallcaps and midcaps lost about 2% and 1.5%, respectively.
The only outlier was the IT index, which rose 1.6%. The country’s top IT firm Tata Consultancy Services jumped 3.9% – the most on the Nifty 50 – after it said it is betting on Donald Trump’s regime to revive client confidence and discretionary spending in North America, a key market for IT companies.
Both Nifty and Sensex have lost about 2.7% this week due to sustained foreign outflows amid fears of a slowdown in corporate earnings as well as the rising potential for fewer U.S. rate cuts, which makes emerging markets a less attractive investment.
“Worries over potential moderation in corporate earnings on the back of concerns of a likely slowdown in the overall economy has led to the drop in the markets this week,” said Anita Gandhi, founder and head of institution at Arihant Capital Markets.
Among individual stocks, private lender IndusInd Bank lost 2.8% after Goldman Sachs downgraded the stock to “neutral” from “buy”, citing earnings pressure due to rising defaults in its commercial retail portfolio.
IndusInd Bank was the top loser in the bank index, which fell 1%.
Fast-moving consumer goods company Adani Wilmar fell 9.3% after the Adani group launched the sale of its stake in the company to the public at a 15% discount to Thursday’s closing price.
(Reporting by Bharath Rajeswaran and Indranil Sarkar in Bengaluru; Editing by Savio D’Souza and Janane Venkatraman)
