Indian shares hit record highs on banks, FMCG boost; sugar stocks drop

DWARIKESH SUGAR INDUSTRIES

18/08/2021 06:25

By Vishwadha Chander
    BENGALURU, Aug 18 (Reuters) - Indian shares hit record highs
on Wednesday, boosted by heavyweight HDFC Bank after the
country's central bank relaxed restrictions on the
private-sector lender for issuing new credit cards.
    By 0457 GMT, the blue-chip NSE Nifty 50 index  .NSEI  was
0.48% higher at 16,693.45, while the benchmark S&P BSE Sensex
 .BSESN  was up 0.50% at 56,069.34.
    HDFC Bank  HDBK.NS  jumped as much as 3.35% after the
Reserve Bank of India (RBI) allowed the lender to issue new
credit cards, months after it curbed some operations of the bank
due to outages in its digital payment services.  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL4N2PO3JD
    However, the RBI's ban on the bank introducing new digital
initiatives will continue. 
    The Nifty Bank index  .NSEBANK  climbed as much as 1.06%.
    "Overall, banking has been kind of a laggard for quite a
while, owing to sluggish loan growth and deteriorating asset
quality sequentially," Siddhartha Khemka, head of retail
research at Motilal Oswal Financial Services, Mumbai said.
    While a lot more economic activity was allowed during the
second wave, compared with the first, the fear of a another wave
was impacting banking stocks, he also said.  
    The Nifty FMCG index  .NIFTYFMCG , meanwhile, added 0.48%.
Khemka attributed the climb to data that showed the demand from
the rural economy was outpacing that from urban areas. 
    Among other shares, sugar stocks fell after a Reuters report
that the country is expected to withdraw sugar export subsidies
from the new season beginning October.  urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL1N2PP01H 
    Balrampur Chini  BACH.NS , Dwarikesh Sugars  DWAR.NS  and
Shree Renuka Sugars  SRES.NS  were down between 2.6% and 5%.
    Among broader markets, Asian shares held near year-to-date
lows as overnight declines on Wall Street reinforced worries
about the economic impact of the Delta coronavirus variant.
 MKTS/GLOB 
    

 (Reporting by Vishwadha Chander in Bengaluru; editing by
Uttaresh.V)
 ((Vishwadha.Chander@thomsonreuters.com; Mobile: +91 7506036802;
Twitter: https://twitter.com/vishwadha;))