Sensex, Nifty Fall on Budget Day Hike in Securities Tax

Mumbai, Jul 24 (PTI) Stock market benchmarks indices Sensex and Nifty declined in early trade on Wednesday, extending their Budget day fall, after the government proposed to hike securities transaction tax on futures & options.

Foreign fund outflows and a weak trend in global markets also played spoilsport for the domestic markets.

After a weak beginning, the 30-share BSE Sensex further declined 233.7 points to 80,195.34. The NSE Nifty dipped 73.45 points to 24,405.60.

From the Sensex pack, Hindustan Unilever dropped 3 per cent after the firm reported just a 2.2 per cent rise in consolidated net profit at Rs 2,612 crore for April-June FY25 impacted by price reductions.

Bajaj Finance, Nestle, HCL Technologies, UltraTech Cement, Mahindra & Mahindra and Adani Ports were the other big laggards.

However, ITC, Tata Motors, Tech Mahindra and NTPC were among the gainers.

The key benchmark indices ended marginally lower in volatile trade on Tuesday as the government proposed to hike the securities transaction tax on futures & options in the Budget for 2024-25.

On Tuesday, the BSE benchmark settled lower by 73.04 points or 0.09 per cent at 80,429.04. The Nifty dipped 30.20 points or 0.12 per cent to 24,479.05.

"Now that the steep increase in STCGs (Short-Term Capital Gains Tax) and the marginal increase in LTCGs (Long Term Capital Gains Tax) on equity is a reality, investors should focus on investing in stocks which can deliver superior returns. In the present context FMCG stocks look attractive from the valuation perspective," said V K Vijayakumar, Chief Investment Strategist, Geojit Financial Services.

In Asian markets, Seoul, Tokyo, and Hong Kong were trading lower while Shanghai quoted higher.

The US markets ended marginally lower on Tuesday.

Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) offloaded equities worth Rs 2,975.31 crore on Tuesday, according to exchange data.

Global oil benchmark Brent crude traded higher by 0.38 per cent to USD 81.32 a barrel.