Sensex slips 150 points, Nifty below 11,950 amid trade war fears

NEW DELHI: Indian equities opened in the negative territory on Wednesday, in the light of weak Asian cues due to lingering trade war between the US and China.

Asian share markets were subdued as the US President Donald Trump reaffirmed his stricter views on trade talks with China.

Trump on Tuesday defended the use of tariffs as part of his trade strategy while China vowed a tough response if the United States insists on escalating trade tensions amid ongoing negotiations, Reuters reported.

Moreover, Trump has again criticised India's high import tariff on the iconic Harley Davidson motorcycles as unacceptable.

Market participants now await April industrial growth prints and May retail inflation numbers, slated for release later today, to get directional cues.

Equity barometer Sensex fell 170 points ot 39,780 while Nifty touched 11,913 in early deals.


Around 9:30 am, the 30-share Sensex was 140 points, or 0.35 per cent, down at 39,811 with 21 stocks in the red.

The NSE Nifty was 44 points or 0.36 per cent down at 11,922 around that time. Among the 50 stocks in the Nifty index, 33 were declining.

In line with benchmark Sensex, midcaps and smallcaps, too, traded in the red. The BSE Midcap and Smallcap indices were down 0.16 per cent and 0.13 per cent, respectively.

In the Sensex kitty, YES Bank, HCL Technologies, Bharti Airtel and Hero MotoCorp were among the top losers.

On the other hand, Vedanta, Tata Steel, Asian Paints and Sun Pharma were among the top gainers in the Sensex pack.

Among the sectoral indices, telecom, IT, teck, finance, bankex and capital goods were in the red on BSE.

On Tuesday, foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) bought Rs 96 crore worth of domestic stocks on Tuesday, data available with NSE suggested. DIIs were net sellers to the tune of Rs 151 crore, data suggests.