Indian benchmark indexes trimmed losses on Wednesday after the Reserve Bank of India cut interest rates as expected to support growth, though global trade tensions continued to weigh on investor sentiment.
The Nifty 50 was down 0.38% at 22,451.35 at 10:06 a.m. IST while the BSE Sensex lost 0.24% to 74,046.13. The indexes were 0.6% lower ahead of the policy decision.
The RBI cut its key repo rate for the second consecutive time to combat sluggish economic growth, which is facing additional headwinds from U.S. tariffs. It also changed the monetary policy stance to “accommodative” from “neutral”.
U.S. President Donald Trump’s “reciprocal” tariffs on dozens of countries took effect on Wednesday, including massive 104% duties on Chinese goods, deepening his global trade war even as he prepared for negotiations with some nations.
Broad-based selling in Indian stocks persisted, with 12 of the 13 major sectors falling, and both smallcap and midcap stocks losing 1.3% each.
Indian shares rebound on bargain buying ahead of RBI rate decision
IT stocks, which derive a significant portion of their revenue from the U.S., dropped 2.6%, while the pharma index fell 1.8% following comments from U.S. President Donald Trump about imposing major tariffs on pharmaceutical imports.
Asian markets tanked, with the MSCI Asia ex-Japan dropping 2.2%. Japan’s Nikkei 225 shed 3.7%.
Comments
Comments are closed for this article.