SENSEX, NIFTY50 subdued; Eicher Motors, Apollo Hospitals shares surge after Q3 earnings

The Indian equity benchmarks erased intraday gains and turned lacklustre on Wednesday, February 11, owing to profit booking after three days of up move.

The SENSEX fell as much as 341 points from day's highest level and NIFTY50 index touched an intraday low of 25,909 after surpassing its important psychological level of 26,000 in the opening deals.

Weakness in index heavyweights like Infosys, Bharti Airtel, Larsen & Toubro, ITC, Tata Consultancy Services and HCL Technologies were seen dragging the benchmarks lower. However, buying in Reliance, Mahindra & Mahindra, HDFC Bank and State Bank of India capped the downside for the markets.

As of 10:20 am, the SENSEX was up 43 points at 84,316 and NIFTY50 index advanced 18 points to 25,953.

Asian shares were trading higher ahead of US jobs data after weak retail sales data ignited hopes of a rate cut by the US Federal Reserve.

Australia's S&P/ASX 200 index advanced 1.48%, China's Shanghai Composite advanced 0.3%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng climbed 0.42% and South Korea's KOSPI advanced 0.84%.

Back home, nine of 15 sector gauges compiled by the National Stock Exchange (NSE) were trading higher led by the NIFTY Auto index's over 1% gain. NIFTY FMCG, Healthcare, Consumer Durables, IT, Financial Services and Pharma indices also rose between 0.1%-0.8%.

On the flipside, NIFTY Bank, PSU Bank, Private Bank, Media and Realty indices were trading lower.

Broader markets were trading on a subdued note as NIFTY Midcap 100 index fell 0.09% and NIFTY Smallcap 100 index declined 0.2%.

Eicher Motors was top gainer in the NIFTY50 index, the stock jumped nearly 7% to hit a fresh 52-week high of ₹7,786 after its board approved the capacity expansion plan for Royal Enfield. The company reported a consolidated net profit of ₹1,421 crore in the third quarter of the current financial year, marking an increase of 21% from ₹1,170 crore in the same period last year.

The Delhi-based company's revenue from operations rose 23% to ₹6,114 crore in the October-December period from ₹4,973 crore in the year-ago period.

The company reported strong operational performance as its EBITDA (Earnings Before Interest, Taxes, Depreciation, and Amortization) jumped 30% to ₹1,557 crore from ₹1,201 crore. Its EBITDA margin improved by 130 basis points to 25.46%.

Apollo Hospitals advanced over 5% after it posted a 35% increase in consolidated profit after tax (PAT) to ₹502 crore in the December quarter, led by strong performances across three business verticals.

The healthcare provider reported a PAT of ₹372 crore in the October-December quarter of the last fiscal year.

The revenue increased to ₹6,477 crore for the third quarter as compared with ₹5,527 crore in the year-ago period, Apollo Hospitals said in a statement.

Max Healthcare, Tata Motors PV, Mahindra & Mahindra, Titan, Nestle India and Tata Steel also rose between 1%-2.6%.

On the flipside, ONGC, Coal India, Hindalco, Grasim, Eternal and HCL Technologies were among the top laggards in the NIFTY50 index.

The overall market breadth was negative as 1,511 shares were declining while 1,147 were advancing on the NSE.