Sensex, Nifty to open on a weak note

Asian markets are playing catch up on the downside as they opened after a break. Hong Kong is down over 3%, South Korea’s Kospi has dropped over 2%.

The market is trying hard to maintain some balance. Though it manages few spikes intra-day and pares some losses, the indices are finding it hard to even close in the green. US Fed Chair Janet Yellen said what the market wished to hear. In her testimony said the Fed expects that with gradual adjustments in the monetary policy stance, economic activity will expand at a moderate pace in the coming years and that labour market indicators will continue to strengthen. Yellen says going by the strength in the US labour market, Fed was primed for 'gradual rate hike path' to achieve its two per cent inflation target.

The outlook is a weak start again. The Nifty has breached previous low of 7240 and has also closed below the same. We expect that index will shift to new zone on the downside and unless some bottom fishing happens aggressively, Nifty could slide towards 6889 in the near term.

Heavy-weight results are on tap including SBI, Tata Motors, ONGC, Coal India, Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd, Hero Motocorp, Essar Shipping, Ashok Leyland, Bank Of India, BEML, 3I Infotech, Amtek Auto, A2Z Infra Engineering and Coffee Day Enterprises.

Asian markets are playing catch up on the downside as they opened after a break. Hong Kong is down over 3%, South Korea’s Kospi has dropped over 2%.

US markets closed in the red. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 99.64 points, or 0.6%, to end at 15,914.74 - its fourth straight day of declines. This marks the blue-chip index’s longest period of declines since Aug. 18 to Aug. 25. Weakness in Walt Disney Co., which hit a 52-week low, and IBM cut about 50 points from the Dow industrials. The S&P 500 index finished unchanged at 1,851.86.

Materials and Energy sectors led the losses, following a drop in oil prices. Only two of the S&P 500’s 10 sectors closed in the green: Healthcare was up 0.9% and Technology gained 0.4%. The S&P 500 is down 9.4% year to date. The Nasdaq Composite index advanced by 14.83 points, or 0.4%, to settle at 4,283.59.

Finland-based Nordea Fund acquired over 17 lakh equity shares of Reliance Infrastructure for Rs. 75.16 crore through an open market transaction.

Bharti Airtel is in talks to merge its wholly-owned Sri Lanka unit into Dialog Axiata in a likely share-swap deal, two people familiar with the matter said.

Mylan NV said that it has agreed to buy Swedish pharmaceutical company Meda AB for US$7.2 billion in cash and stock.

Mukesh Bansal, who was handling the commerce and advertising operations at Flipkart, quit on Wednesday after a two-year stint.

Bansal would, however, be an advisor to the company, Flipkart said in a statement.

Some e-commerce companies will shut down in the next few months, Future Group’s Kishore Biyani was quoted as saying on Wednesday.