Domestic Markets closes in red; Sensex ends 214 points down & Nifty settles above 17,000-mark

Bears stuck the Dalal street on Wednesday, September 1, 2021, as key benchmark indices ended with modest losses amid profit booking after recent steep gains. The S&P BSE Sensex fell 214.18 points or 0.37 per cent to end at 57,338.21. The Nifty 50 index lost 55.95 points or 0.33 per cent to close at 17,076.25. However, the Nifty Bank index rose 149.70 points or 0.41 per cent to settle at 36,574.30.

The broader markets outperformed at the BSE with S&P BSE MidCap rose 0.92 per cent and S&P BSE SmallCap ended 0.22 per cent higher.

Sellers outnumbered buyers. On the BSE, 1,509 shares rose and 1,668 shares fell. On the Nifty 50 at the NSE, 21 shares rose and 29 shares fell. The top five gainers on Nifty 50 are Asian Paints (up 3.10 per cent), Tata Motors (up 2.56 per cent), SBI Life (up 1.87 per cent), Nestle India (up 1.73 per cent) and Axis Bank (up 1.51 per cent). The top five losers were Mahindra & Mahindra (down 2.96 per cent), Cipla (down 2.73 per cent), Tata Steel (down 2.71 per cent), Hindalco (down 2.20 per cent) and Bajaj Finserv (down 2.10 per cent).

COVID-19 update

Total COVID-19 confirmed cases worldwide were at 21,77,14,423 with 45,19,287 deaths. India reported 3,78,181 active cases of COVID-19 infection and 4,39,020 deaths while 3,19,93,644 patients have been discharged, data showed.

Economy

The seasonally adjusted IHS Markit India Manufacturing Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) was at 52.3 in August, pointing to an improvement in overall operating conditions for the second straight month. The headline figure fell from 55.3 in July, indicating a softer rate of growth that was subdued in the context of historical survey data.

India's GDP surged 20.1 per cent in the April-June quarter of the current fiscal. The GDP logged a high growth amid the opening of the economy after the lockdown to arrest COVID-19 and low base effect as the economy witnessed a contraction of 24.4 per cent in the first quarter of 2020-21 fiscal.

Further, India's fiscal deficit for the April-July period was at Rs 3.21 lakh crore ($43.98 billion), which is 21.3 per cent of the full fiscal's target.

The eurozone inflation data for August showed consumer prices increased by 3 per cent this month from a year ago, according to preliminary estimates.

China's Caixin/Markit Manufacturing Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI) fell to 49.2 last month, from 50.3 in July. In other US economic data, the Chicago purchasing managers index dropped to 66.8 in August from a previous reading of 73.4. Home prices rose 18.6 per cent annually in June, up from a 16.8 per cent increase in May, according to the S&P CoreLogic Case-Shiller national home price index.