By Bharath Rajeswaran
(Reuters) -India’s benchmark indexes were little changed on Thursday, as investors awaited key corporate earnings and the Reserve Bank of India’s rate decision.
The Nifty 50 was off 0.14% at 23,664.9 points as of 9:47 a.m. IST, while the BSE Sensex had slipped 0.14% to 78,158.1.
They had opened about 0.3% higher after logging marginal losses in the previous session, with sentiment remaining neutral ahead of the RBI’s widely expected first interest rate cut in nearly five years.
A rate cut, if it happens, will follow less than a week after the government, in the federal budget, cut personal tax rates to stimulate consumption.
The benchmarks have taken “a pause after the rebound” on Tuesday and are awaiting the RBI’s rate decision and commentary and some key Nifty 50 companies for directional triggers, said Prashanth Tapse, senior vice president of research at Mehta Equities.
Six Nifty companies — State Bank of India, Trent, Bharti Airtel, Hero MotoCorp, Britannia and ITC — are due to report their quarterly earnings on the day.
Eight of the 13 major sectors declined in morning trade.
The broader, more domestically focused small-caps and mid-caps traded flat, erasing opening gains.
Among individual stocks, food delivery and quick commerce platform Swiggy lost about 8% to a record low after reporting a wider loss in the third quarter.
Winemaker Sula Vineyards dropped 4% after posting a 35% slide in its December-quarter profit, hurt by a slowdown in urban consumption.
Trucking firm VRL Logistics jumped 14% after logging a rise in quarterly profit.
(Reporting by Bharath Rajeswaran in Bengaluru; Editing by Sherry Jacob-Phillips and Savio D’Souza)
