At 13:30 IST, the barometer index, the S&P BSE Sensex was down 290.36 points or 0.36% 79,759.54. The Nifty 50 index declined 44.15 points or 0.18% to 24,258.

In the broader market, the S&P BSE Mid-Cap index added 0.66% and the S&P BSE Small-Cap index rose 0.75%.

The market breadth was positive. On the BSE, 2,119 shares rose and 1,731 shares fell. A total of 103 shares were unchanged.

Gainers & Losers:

Oil and Natural Gas Corporation (up 3.56%), Divi's Laboratories (up 2.42%), Cipla (up 1.91%), Britannia Industries (up 1.68%) and Hindustan Unilever (up 1.48%) were major Nifty gainers.

HDFC Bank (down 4.50%), Titan Company (down 2.03%), Tata Steel (down 1.03%), IndusInd Bank (down 0.79%) and UltraTech Cement (down 0.78%) were major Nifty losers.

HDFC Bank declined 4.50%. The bank said that its gross advances aggregated to approximately Rs 24.87 lakh crore as of 30 June 2024, a growth of around 52.6% over Rs 16.30 lakh crore as of 30 June 2023.

Stocks in Spotlight:

Raymond zoomed 15.46% to after the company’s board approved the vertical demerger of its Real Estate business into its wholly owned subsidiary, Raymond Realty (RRL).

IRCON International gained 4.66% after the company announced that its joint venture IRCON-PARAS-PCM has been awarded a letter of award (LoA) from Rail Vikas Nigam for a project worth Rs 750.82 crore.

KDDL surged 6.04% after the company said that its board is scheduled to meet on 9 July 2024 to consider the proposal for buyback of equity shares.

Global Markets:

European shares advanced on Friday lifted by expectations of the U.S. Federal Reserve cutting interest rates in September. This positive investor sentiment was further bolstered by the euro's rise to a three-week high in anticipation of the French elections.

Most Asian stocks declined. Japan's household spending dropped to 1.8% in May, falling short of expectations for a 0.1% gain. This metric is closely watched by the Bank of Japan as an indicator of a healthy economic cycle where wages and prices rise together.

The United States stock market was closed on Thursday, July 4th, in observance of Independence Day.