India's Sensex retreats from record high; Lenders fall

Indian shares retreated from record levels in early session on Tuesday as realty, auto, healthcare and metal stocks fell as investors booked profits.

india trader
Reuters

Indian shares retreated from record levels in early session on Tuesday as realty, auto, healthcare and metal stocks fell as investors booked profits.

The S&P BSE Sensex fell 0.08 percent at 32,609 while the broader NSE Nifty rose 0.04 percent to 10,234. Sensex touched a record high of 32,687.32 points while 50-stock Nifty index touched its life-time high of 10,242.95 earlier in the previous session.

Among the top Sensex gainers: Bharti Airtel rose 3 percent, Asian Paints added 2 percent, Cipla gained 4 percent while Bajaj Auto advanced 1 percent.

Top losers were Tata Motors lost 1 percent, Axis Bank fell 1.4 percent, Infosys shed 0.8 percent while Dr. Reddy's dropped 0.6 percent.

Persistent Systems rose 2 percent after the company reported better then expected earnings for September quarter.

Visa Steel jumped 8 percent after the central bank raised foreign investment limit in the company to 74 percent.

Sasken Technologies jumped 9 percent after the company reported 55 percent increase in its net profit in September quarter.

Market breadth was in the favour of gainers, with about 2 stocks advancing to every 1 stock that declined.

Asian equities gained but sentiment remained muted as concerns about North Korea reemerged.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was up 0.1 percent having gained 10 of the past 12 sessions.

North Korea warned that a nuclear war could "break out any moment," sparking a pullback in the region's markets -- one of a number of geopolitical risks, along with the Brexit and Catalan-secession impasses.

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