India shares lower at close of trade; Nifty 50 down 0.79%

Investing.com – India equities were lower at the close on Friday, as losses in the , and sectors propelled shares lower.

At the close in NSE, the lost 0.79%, while the index declined 0.72%.

The biggest gainers of the session on the were Bajaj Auto Ltd (NS:), which rose 3.36% or 111.05 points to trade at 3419.80 at the close. Hindustan Unilever Ltd. (NS:) added 2.81% or 63.60 points to end at 2325.40 and Maruti Suzuki India Ltd. (NS:) was up 1.91% or 153.25 points to 8189.60 in late trade.

Biggest losers included Bajaj Finserv Ltd (NS:), which lost 5.35% or 923.75 points to trade at 16335.20 in late trade. Shree Cements Ltd. (NS:) declined 4.50% or 1172.35 points to end at 24900.00 and Tech Mahindra Ltd (NS:) shed 4.40% or 73.35 points to 1593.55.

The top performers on the BSE Sensex 30 were Hindustan Unilever Ltd. (BO:) which rose 2.68% to 2322.20, Maruti Suzuki India Ltd. (BO:) which was up 1.89% to settle at 8188.60 and Housing Development Finance Corporation Ltd (BO:) which gained 1.02% to close at 2595.00.

The worst performers were Bajaj Finserv Ltd (BO:) which was down 5.37% to 16333.05 in late trade, Tech Mahindra Ltd (BO:) which lost 4.44% to settle at 1594.15 and Tata Steel Ltd (BO:) which was down 3.18% to 1169.05 at the close.

Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 1411 to 406 and 19 ended unchanged; on the Bombay Stock Exchange, 2284 fell and 993 advanced, while 86 ended unchanged on the India National Stock Exchange.

The , which measures the implied volatility of Nifty 50 options, was up 6.17% to 18.8875 a new 1-month high.

In commodities trading, Gold Futures for February delivery was down 0.40% or 7.45 to $1835.15 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in March fell 1.61% or 1.38 to hit $84.17 a barrel, while the March Brent oil contract fell 1.52% or 1.34 to trade at $87.04 a barrel.

USD/INR was down 0.06% to 74.373, while EUR/INR rose 0.15% to 84.3280.

The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.12% at 95.610.