Nifty hovers above 24,700; European mkt opens higher

The headline equity benchmarks continued to trade near the flat line in afternoon trade. The Nifty traded above the 24,700 level after hitting the day's low of 24,654.50 in early trade. Media, consumer durables and FMCG shares advanced while realty, PSU bank and bank shares declined.

At 13:30 IST, the barometer index, the S&P BSE Sensex, declined 122.18 points or 0.15% to 80,677.13. The Nifty 50 index added 6.15 points or 0.02% to 24,705.

The broader market outperformed the frontline indices. The S&P BSE Mid-Cap index added 0.10% and the S&P BSE Small-Cap index rose 0.67%.

The market breadth was strong. On the BSE, 2,432 shares rose and 1,395 shares fell. A total of 125 shares were unchanged.

Gainers & Losers:

Divi's Laboratories (up 3.29%), Titan Company (up 2.65%), HDFC Life Insurance Company (up 2.15%), Hindalco Industries (up 2.14%) and SBI Life Insurance Company (up 1.88%) were major Nifty gainers.

UltraTech Cement (down 1.33%), HDFC Bank (down 1.16%), Tata Steel (down 1.10%), State Bank of India (down 1.01%) and ICICI Bank (down 0.95%) were major Nifty losers.

Stocks in Spotlight:

Larsen & Toubro rose 0.83%. The EPC major announced that it has secured a large order for its Transportation Infrastructure Business for the integrated infrastructure development project in Navi Mumbai.

Meanwhile, the company informed that the Bombay High Court has quashed and set aside the show-cause notice and Rs 2,237-crore demand issued by the GST authorities.

Hindustan Zinc shed 0.08%. The company announced that it has received a GST demand notice amounting to Rs 26.12 crore from the Office of the Commissioner of Central Excise & CGST Commissionerate.

Oriental Rail Infrastructure was locked in 5% upper circuit after the company reported consolidated net profit of Rs 4.37 crore in Q1 FY25 as compared with net loss of Rs 8.01 crore posted in Q1 FY24. Revenue from operations was at Rs 172.03 crore in first quarter of FY25, registering a growth of 42.91% as against Rs 120.37 crore posted a year ago.

Genus Power Infrastructures was locked in 5% upper circuit after the company's subsidiary secured three letters of award (LoAs) worth Rs 3,608.52 crore.

RMC switchgears hit an upper circuit of 5% after the company's subsidiary, RMC Green Energy secured approval from the Rajasthan Renewable Energy Corporation to establish a 50 megawatt (MW) renewable energy park in Rajasthan.

Exide Industries advanced 1.73% after the company said that it has invested Rs 74.99 crore in its wholly owned subsidiary, Exide Energy Solutions (EESL) by way of subscription to share capital on right basis.

Global Markets:

European shares advanced while Asian stocks traded mixed on Wednesday, tracking a pullback on Wall Street and reflecting investor caution ahead of a key speech by Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell later this week.

The weakness in the U.S. market, where the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed down 0.15%, the S&P 500 fell 0.2%, and the Nasdaq Composite dropped 0.33%, spilled over into Asia.

Japan's Nikkei index likely mirrored this cautiousness, as data revealed a smaller-than-expected export growth and a surge in imports, resulting in a trade deficit for July.

Hong Kong's Hang Seng index was further pressured by a significant decline in e-commerce giant JD.com's stock price. News reports suggesting Walmart's planned sale of its stake in JD.com for $3.74 billion contributed to the 11% drop in JD stock.