Nifty hovers around 8550, Sensex weak; ACC, Ambuja Cements gain

Moneycontrol Bureau12:45 pm European stocks opened slightly higher as markets await the latest monetary policy decision from the European Central Bank (ECB) and digest a slew of earnings from major corporates.

The pan-European STOXX 600 was 0.19 percent higher.12:35 pm Buzzing: Shares of Welspun Corp added 8.5 percent intraday as it has received a order to supply line-pipe from American company.The company has entered into a definitive agreement with an American midstream major to supply over at 274 kilometers (at 184K MTs) heavy wall, large diameter, 18 meters length, longitudinal saw line-pipe for a prestigious gas project in Americas.With this order, the current order book of the company has crossed at 958K MTs worth Rs 5500 crore.12:20 pm Earnings: India's second largest private sector lender HDFC Bank matched analysts' expectations on Thursday with the profit rising 20.14 percent year-on-year to Rs 3,239 crore. It was driven by other income, operating profit and slightly better-than-expected net interest income but higher provisions and tax cost limited the profit growth.

Net interest income, the difference between interest earned and interest expended, grew by 21.8 percent to Rs 7,781 crore in the quarter ended June 2016 compared with Rs 6,389 crore in year-ago period. Net interest margin sequentially increased to 4.4 percent from 4.3 percent.

Provisions for bad loans remained at elevated level, up 19 percent YoY and 30.8 percent QoQ to Rs 866.7 crore in Q1FY17.

Asset quality slightly weakened during the quarter with the gross non-performing assets (NPA) rising 10 basis points sequentially to 1.04 percent and net NPA by 4 bps to 0.32 percent for the quarter ended June 2016.

Also read - CS warns: 'Global investors acting as if they're running out of bonds to buy'12:00 pm Market Check

Equity benchmarks traded lower amid consolidation in noon trade despite positive trend in Asian peers.

The 30-share BSE Sensex was down 80.46 points at 27835.43 and the 50-share NSE Nifty fell 13.70 points to 8552.15.

ACC topped the buying list on Nifty, up nearly 5 percent followed by Adani Ports, Coal India, Cipla, Bharti Airtel, Asian Paints, BPCL, Ambuja Cements and Grasim with 1-2 percent.

Axis Bank, Dr Reddy's Labs, BHEL, Reliance Industries, Tata Steel and Bank of Baroda were top losers, down 1-2 percent.

L&T Infotech, which listed at a discount today, remained most active stock on exchanges followed by Axis Bank, Infosys, Tata Metaliks, Wipro, Wockhardt, HPCL and Shriram City.