Indian equities, forex, and commodities bourses remained closed on November 5, Wednesday, on account of the holiday, Prakash Gurpurb Sri Guru Nanak Dev, better known as Guru Nanak Jayanti.
The relief to the market in terms of the holiday came a day after a massively disappointing run by benchmark indices Nifty and Sensex. On Tuesday, Sensex tanked 519 points while the Nifty fell below the 25,600 mark on profit-taking in critical sectoral stocks.
Foreign fund outflows did not help matters. Asian peers, South Korea's Kospi, Japan's Nikkei 225 index, Shanghai's SSE Composite index and Hong Kong's Hang Seng index, all ended lower for the day.
The Sensex dropped 0.62 per cent to settle at 83,459.15 with only 5 constituents closing in the green. The NSE Nifty shed by 0.64 per cent to 25,597.65, as it saw red in stocks like PowerGrid, Eternal, and Adani Enterprises.
Power Grid was the biggest loser, dropping 3.13 per cent on the BSE. However, Titan emerged as the top gainer, lifting by 2.28 per cent on the back of positive second-quarter earnings.
Titan, TCPL, Mahindra, Adani, IndiGo earnings
Titan had, on Monday, posted a 59 per cent rise in Q2 consolidated net profit of Rs 1,120 crore. Bharti Airtel, too, posted its earnings, with a two-fold increase in consolidated net profit at Rs 8,651 crore for Q2 vs Rs 4,153.4 crore a year ago. This led to Tuesday rallies for both stocks.
Tata's FMCG arm, Tata Consumer Products Ltd (TCPL), had on Monday posted a 10.7 per cent jump in quarterly consolidated net profit to Rs 406.51 crore.
Later on Tuesday, Mahindra & Mahindra posted a 28 per cent jump in its consolidated Q2 profit after tax to Rs 3,673 crore.
Adani Group's flagship Adani Enterprises also reported an 84 per cent jump in consolidated net profit of Rs 3,199 crore in the September quarter. But this was due to a one-time exceptional income. Profits would have turned to losses without this one-time adjustment, as Adani Enterprises EBITDA slid on low volumes and coal prices.
Among the worst hit was IndiGo, the market leader of Indian civil aviation, as it widened its loss to Rs 2,582.10 crore for the September quarter, with forex and expense items eating into the bottom line.