By Bharath Rajeswaran
BENGALURU (Reuters) -Indian shares rose on Thursday, aided by an uptick in consumer and pharma stocks, after the U.S. Federal Reserve left rates unchanged as anticipated but hinted at the possibility of more hikes later this year.
The blue-chip Nifty 50 index was up 0.18% at 18,789.55 as of 10:29 a.m.
IST, while the benchmark S&P BSE Sensex added 0.11% to 63,300.21.
Both benchmarks were less than 1% below their all-time highs. The midcap index hit a new record high on Thursday, while the smallcap shares rose as much as 0.43% to post a fresh 52-week high.
“Not just the benchmarks, the smallcaps and midcaps have seen tremendous run-up in the recent weeks,” said Saurabh Jain, assistant vice president for retail equities research at SMC Global Securities.
“The markets are likely to take a pause, and a slight correction would only be healthy”.
Five of the 13 major sectoral indexes declined, with high-weightage IT index down over 0.5%.
IT stocks, which are sensitive to interest rates in the U.S. due to the significant share of revenue earned from the country, fell after the Fed kept rates unchanged for the first time in 17 months but signaled the need for borrowing costs to rise.
Fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) stocks advanced 0.6%.
SMC Global’s Jain said a gradual improvement in rural demand and a fall in prices of key raw materials like crude oil and soda ash have aided the rise of FMCG stocks.
Pharma index climbed over 1%, with 11 of the 15 constituents logging gains.
Among individual stocks, shares of Fortis Healthcare and Apollo Hospitals rose over 3% and 2%, respectively, after global brokerage JP Morgan initiated coverage on the stocks with “overweight” ratings.
($1 = 82.1659 Indian Rupees)
(Reporting by Bharath Rajeswaran in Bengaluru; Editing by Sohini Goswami an Dhanya Ann Thoppil)
