Sensex Opens Flat; Axis Bank Falls 1.7% On Weak Q4 Results

Asian markets were mostly lower in morning trade following the lower close on Wall Street as investors analyzed details on U.S. President Donald Trump’s highly-anticipated tax reform plans. The Nikkei 225 is off 0.24% while the Hang Seng is down 0.05%. The Shanghai Composite is down 0.47%. Meanwhile, stock markets in Europe closed their previous session on a positive note.

Meanwhile, Indian share markets have opened the day on a flat note. BSE Sensex is trading higher by 7 points and NSE Nifty is trading higher by 8 points. Meanwhile, S&P BSE Mid Cap and S&P BSE Small Cap are trading higher by 0.3% and 0.4% respectively. Gains are largely seen in realty stocks, auto stocks and consumer durables stocks.

The rupee is trading at 64.00 against the US$.

Axis Bank Ltd reported a 43% decline in net profit in the March quarter from a year ago as the private sector lender raised provisions for bad loans. The company reported a net profit of Rs 12.25 billion as compared to Rs 21.54 billion a year ago.

The bank’s gross and net non-performing assets as a share of its total loan book recovered slightly from the December quarter numbers, but were still far higher than a year ago. Axis Bank plans to close its Rs 94.36 billion watch list of bad loans by the end of 2018.

Axis Bank share price opened the trading day down by 1.7% on the BSE.

Meanwhile, as per an article in The Livemint, Housing Development Finance Corp. Ltd (HDFC) is in talks with online classifieds company Quikr India Pvt. Ltd to sell its brokerage business HDFC Realty and its digital business HDFC Red in an all-stock deal.

HDFC share price opened down by 0.8%.

In news from cement sector, ACC is expecting a faster growth in the second half of the year on rise in in government spending on infrastructure projects and possibility of good monsoon this season.