After 8-day rally, Indian share market in red; Sensex down over 560 points, Nifty below 18,650

Mumbai: Equity benchmark indices - Sensex and Nifty - on Friday halted their eight-day rally and traded in the red due to profit booking by investors and weak global cues. After beginning the trade on a negative note, the 30-share BSE Sensex further declined 305.61 points to 62,978.58. The broader NSE Nifty dipped 79.65 points to 18,732.85. At 12:12 IST, Sensex traded at 62,715.90 points, down 568.29 points or 0.90 per cent, whereas Nifty traded at 18,647.95 points, down 164.55 points or 0.87 per cent. Among the Sensex pack, Hindustan Unilever, Maruti, UltraTech Cement, Mahindra & Mahindra, Asian Paints and Nestle were among the major laggards. Tata Steel, Tech Mahindra, IndusInd Bank, Reliance Industries and ITC were the winners. The indices had hit their lifetime highs for the fourth straight day till Thursday. Sensex, on Wednesday, breached the 63,000-mark. From 60,000 to 63,000, the markets took 14 months time. Massive foreign fund inflows into Indian equities, the appreciating rupee, and hints by the US central bank about the moderating rate of interest hikes supported investors’ sentiment. On Wednesday, the US Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell hinted about moderating interest rate hikes in the next monetary policy meeting. Also, according to data by NSDL, foreign portfolio investors purchased Rs 36,239 crore worth of equities in India in November. As for the global markets, Wall Street on Thursday ended mostly lower. Elsewhere in Asia, markets in Seoul, Tokyo, Shanghai and Hong Kong were trading lower. International oil benchmark Brent crude was trading 0.30 per cent higher at USD 87.14 per barrel. Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) offloaded shares worth Rs 1,565.93 crore on Thursday, as per exchange data. With inputs from agencies Read all the Latest News , Trending News ,  Cricket News , Bollywood News , India News and Entertainment News here. Follow us on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram.