Indian shares were muted on Monday as investors awaited inflation data, due later in the day, for clues on the central bank’s interest rate trajectory and ahead of a slew of corporate earnings reports.
The NSE Nifty 50 index was up 0.1% to 18,366 as of 0405 GMT, while the S&P BSE Sensex, which hit a record closing high on Friday, rose 0.19% to 61909.51.
A Reuters poll showed economists expect retail price inflation slowed to 6.73% in October, due to weaker food price rises and a strong base year, but remained stubbornly above the Reserve Bank of India’s 6% upper limit.
In early trading, Nifty’s IT and metal indexes were among the top-performing sectors, gaining 0.9% and 1.6%, respectively. The pharma and public sector bank indexes dropped nearly 1%.
Life Insurance Corporation of India rose 7.3% on after reporting a surge in quarterly profit.
More than 1,000 companies are scheduled to report results later in the day. These include low-cost carrier SpiceJet, drugmaker Biocon, tyre manufacturer Apollo Tyres as well as conglomerates Godrej Industries and Grasim Industries.
Foreign institutional investors bought a net of 39.58 billion Indian rupees (about $492 million) of equities on Friday, while domestic investors bought 6.16 billion rupees of shares, as per provisional data available with the National Stock Exchange. ($1 = 80.4770 Indian rupees)
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