Indian stock markets, lost the initial gains and fell below the dotted line during the post noon trading session. Majority of the sectoral indices are trading in the negative territory with realty, banking and IT stocks being the biggest losers.
BSE-Sensex is down by 78 points and NSE-Nifty is trading down by 25 points. While the BSE Mid Cap is trading up by 0.03%, BSE Small Cap index is trading up by 0.03%. The rupee is trading at 53.29 to the US dollar.
Most of the pharma stocks are trading in the green with Lupin Ltd and Aurobindo Pharma being among the top gainers. Sun Pharma has announced that its shareholders have given the green signal to spin off its domestic formulations operations into a new entity called Sun Pharma Laboratories Ltd. The new entity will be a wholly owned subsidiary of Sun Pharmaceuticals Industries Ltd (SPIL). Reportedly, both the domestic and international segments of the company are growing well. And Sun Pharma's rationale for spinning off the domestic segment is that it will help the company maintain its growth momentum. Further, it will also help it focus on each of the operations individually. The assets of the domestic formulations business will be transferred to the transferee company. The stock is trading up by 0.5%.
Telecom stocks are trading mixed with AGC Networks and Tata Teleservices being the biggest gainers and Bharti Airtel and ITI leading among the losers. Bharti Airtel has declared its financial results for the quarter ended December 2012. The company recorded a 9.4% YoY increase in sales during the quarter. The growth was brought about by the increase in revenues from all of its segments. However, its operating margins contracted by 170 basis points (1.7%) to 30.5% on account of higher network operating expenses. At the net level, the company's earnings dipped by 72% YoY largely due to increase in the interest expense, by around 69%. Even the tax outgo rose by 19% as a result of higher tax incidence, reducing net profits for the quarter. The stock is trading down by 0.8%.
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