Overview

• The Sensex closed at 81,306.85, down 0.85%, while the Nifty settled at 24,870.10, with Bank Nifty off about 1.09% and market breadth turning negative.
• Selling intensified as traders awaited Fed Chair Jerome Powell’s speech and after U.S. trade adviser Peter Navarro signaled no relief on tariff measures linked to Russian oil, with a late-August deadline in focus.
• Heavyweights such as HDFC Bank, Reliance Industries, Asian Paints, HCL Technologies, ITC and Kotak Mahindra Bank led the decline, while Mahindra & Mahindra, Maruti Suzuki, Sun Pharma and Bharat Electronics posted modest gains.
• Foreign institutional investors have withdrawn roughly Rs 21,478 crore from equities in August so far, even as domestic institutions provided support earlier in the week.
• Despite Friday’s fall, the indices logged a small weekly gain helped by optimism over GST rate rationalisation and S&P’s sovereign rating upgrade, with a two-slab GST proposal awaiting a GST Council decision.