Sensex, Nifty end flat after early trade; all eyes on RBI policy meet

Equity benchmark indices wiped out all intra-day gains to end flat on Wednesday but metal and auto stocks gained substantially.

When the closing bell rang, the BSE S&P Sensex was down by 25 points or 0.07% at 37,663 but the Nifty 50 gained by 6 points or 0.06% at 11,102.

Except for Nifty pharma, PSU bank, and FMCG, all sectoral indices at the National Stock Exchange were in the positive terrain with Nifty metal moving up by 4.2% and auto by 2.1%.

Among stocks, Hindalco emerged as the top gainer by adding 8.6% at Rs 176.40 per share.

Tata Steel was up by 6.6% at Rs 397.05 while JSW Steel ticked up by 3% to Rs 235.15 per share.

Auto majors, too, advanced with Eicher Motors up by 4.3%, Tata Motors by 3.6%, Mahindra & Mahindra by 2.6% and Maruti Suzuki by 2.5%.

However, those which lost included Reliance Industries, Wipro, HDFC Bank, Nestle India, Tech Mahindra and HCL Technologies.

Meanwhile, Asian markets were mixed as global investors hoped for a fresh stimulus in the United States to shore up the economy in the wake of the COVID-19 crisis.

Hong Kong's Hang Seng moved up by 0.62 % while South Korea`s Kospi gained by 1.493 %. But Japan`s Nikkei was down by 0.26 %.