Indian share markets continued to trade in the negative during the last two hours of trade. All sectoral indices traded in the red except consumer durables stocks.
The BSE-Sensex is trading lower by 168 points and NSE-Nifty is trading lower by 52 points. BSE Mid Cap and BSE Small Cap indices are trading down by 0.5% each. The rupee is trading at 54.92 to the US dollar.
Pharma stocks are trading in the red led by Aurobindo Pharma and Orchid Chemicals. As per a leading daily, the pending pharma policy has been sent back to the Group of Ministers (GoM) to address the concerns raised by the finance ministry. The policy is awaiting the approval of the cabinet. The GoM is headed by Agriculture minister Sharad Pawar and Finance Minister would be a special invitee to the panel's meeting scheduled for Friday. We may recollect here that the new pharma policy aims to cap the prices of 348 essential medicines at the weighted averages of all the drugs in the particular segment with more than 1% market share.
Energy stocks are trading weak led by Petronet LNG and Chennai Petroleum. According to a leading financial daily, Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (ONGC) has entered into a strategic tie up with Inpex Corporation which is among Japan's largest oil companies. The partnership is for exploration of hydrocarbons in one of the acreages in KG basin. The companies have got into a Farm-out-Agreement at ONGC's headquarters in New Delhi. As per the agreement, Inpex has acquired a 26% participating interest in the exploration block of KG-DWN-2004/6, located in the deep waters of Krishna Godavari Basin in the Bay of Bengal. ONGC continues as Operator of the Block with a 34% participating interest in the consortium. Its existing partners are Gas Authority of India Limited, Gujarat State Petroleum Corporation, Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Ltd (HPCL) and Oil India.
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