Mumbai: Equity benchmark indices saw a sharp fall in the afternoon session on Monday and closed flat in line with Asian peers.
The BSE S&P Sensex closed 39 points lower at 41,643 while the Nifty 50 lost by 6 points at 12,266. At the National Stock Exchange, sectoral indices were mixed with Nifty PSU banks falling by 1.3 percent.
Among stocks, index heavyweight Reliance Industries lost by 1.76 percent at Rs 1,570.95 per share. Yes, Bank was down by 3.8 percent, Nestle India by 2.4 percent, State Bank of India by 1.6 percent and Coal India by 1.5 percent.
The other prominent losers were Adani Ports, Tech Mahindra, Britannia, ICICI Bank, and UltraTech Cement. However, those which gained were Zee Entertainment, Vedanta, Maruti Suzuki, Dr. Reddy’s and HDFC.
Meanwhile, Asian stock markets were steady on trade optimism between the United States and China. Reports said US President Donald Trump had a good talk with China’s leader Xi Jinping about phase one of the trade deal they struck recently.
But volumes weakened ahead of the Christmas holiday break and investors squared off their positions. Japan’s Nikkei crawled up by 0.02 percent and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng by 0.13 percent. But South Korea’s market was a shade weaker after losing by 0.02 percent.