The BSE benchmark Sensex edged lower in the afternoon trades on Thursday on the back of selling in capital goods, metal and IT stocks.
The 50-share Nifty was hovering around its important psychological level of 8,900 led by selling in heavyweights like Hindalco, ACC, Larsen & Toubro and TCS.
Capital goods stocks succumbed to profit-booking with stocks like Larsen & Toubro, Siemens, BHEL, Havells, Suzlon and ABB falling over 1 per cent each. The BSE capital goods index was down 1.5 per cent.
Metal, IT, oil & gas, realty, banking and IT stocks were also facing the heat of selling pressure.
Meanwhile, the broader markets were outperforming the benchmark indices. The BSE mid-cap and small-cap indices were up around 0.4 per cent each.
The pharma stocks continued their upmove led by gains in pharma heavyweight Sun Pharmaceuticals Industries. Shares of Sun Pharma have rallied 19 per cent in the last six trading sessions. Lupin, Cipla, Dr Reddy's Labs and Cadila Healthcare were also trading higher.
From the Nifty basket of 50 stocks, 38 were declining. Ultratech Cement was the top loser on the Nifty, down 4.3 per cent at Rs 3,169. NMDC, Hindalco, Grasim Industries, Cairn India, ACC, ICICI Bank, TCS, Larsen & Toubro, Zee Entertainment and Ambuja Cement were also trading 2-3.5 per cent lower.
At 1:57 PM, the Sensex was down 19 points at 29,361 and the Nifty was at 8,907, down 15 points.
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