After Market: Buzzing stocks, open interest gainers and midcap winners

NEW DELHI: After a day’s breather, domestic equities once again came under heavy selling pressure on Thursday, which dragged the benchmark indices to the negative territory.

The S&P BSE Sensex shed 188 points to settle at 37,664 while the broader Nifty50 index of the National Stock Exchange (NSE) lost 50.05 points, or 0.44 per cent, to end at 11,385. As many as 30 index constituents ended in the red.

Here’s a look at key developments about Thursday’s trade: -

Gail India hits over 21-year high
State-run gas utility firm GAIL (India) shares rose as much as 5.16 per cent to Rs 399.40, their highest since March 20, 1997. The oil and gas major last week had reported 22.8 per cent year-on-year (YoY) rise in standalone profit at Rs 1,259.25 crore for June quarter, in line with Rs 1,262 crore PAT projected by analysts in an ETNow poll. The stock shut shop at Rs 393.95 apiece on NSE, up 3.73 per cent.

NBCC rallies after new order
Shares of the company ended 4.56 per cent higher at Rs 75.65 apiece on BSE after the company bagged order from SAIL worth Rs 250 crore in Rourkela, Odisha.

Who moved my Sensex
The HDFC twins, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Reliance Industries, L&T and Vedanta contributed the most to the fall in the index. On the other hand, Infosys, Sun Pharma and ICICI Bank lent the crucial support to the 30-pack.

Spurt in open interest
Balkrishna Industries witnessed the biggest spike in open interest at 22.97 per cent, followed by Berger Paints (21.40 per cent), Kotak Mahindra Bank (18.24 per cent) and Jain Irrigation Systems (16.48 per cent).

Earnings impact
Rain Industries hit an upper circuit limit of 5 per cent of Rs 218.55 apiece on BSE after posting strong quarterly earnings. June quarter profit of the company jumped 95 per cent to Rs 2,948.05 crore against Rs 1,515.31 crore in the year-ago period.

Dilip Buildcon rose over 5 per cent to Rs 888 apiece after the company posted 109 per cent YoY surge in its net profit at Rs 2,555 crore against Rs 1,222 crore in the year-ago period. The stock, however, later pared all the gains to end at Rs 851.50 apiece on BSE, up 0.87 per cent.

Select midcaps, smallcaps fly high
Although the midcap and smallcap indices ended in the red, a slew of companies from these baskets made solid advances during the session. UBL, NBCC, Future Retail and Reliance Nippon Life Asset Management were the top gainers in the midcap space while WPIL, HDIL, BF Investment and Zensar Technologies were among the top gainers in smallcap universe.

Rupee continues to bleed
The domestic unit on Thursday hit a fresh record low of 70.39 against the US dollar. The currency on Tuesday breached the 70 level for the first time ever in intraday trade before recovering a mild 4 paise to settle at 69.94. At the time of writing this report, the currency was trading at 70.26 against the greenback.

Dow futures strong
At 04:00 pm, the Dow Futures were trading 141 points or 0.56 per cent higher at 25,328, indicating a positive opening for the US stocks.

Oversold/overbought stocks
Skipper, Asian Granito India, Matrimony.com, India Power Corp and Shreyas Shipping were the five stocks which have entered the oversold zone. On the contrary, 15 stocks entered the overbought territory. Prominent among them included Aditya Birla Fashion, JK Paper, BF Investment, Lincoln Pharmacy, Saksoft and International Paper.