Nifty Metal defies bearish markets to trade higher; Nalco, Vedanta lead the gains

3 Feb 2022 , 01:00 PM

Nifty Metal was steady despite broader bearish markets on Thursday. The Index was trading higher with National Aluminium leading the gains while Vedanta, NMDC, Hindustan Zinc and Jindal Steel also contributing to the upside by surging over 1% each. APL Apollo Tubes dragged the most.

Benchmark indices opened lower today after four days of gap-up starts. Concerns over the Ukraine crisis and a fall in US stocks futures post weak earnings by Meta, the owner of Facebook, weighed on investor sentiment.

At around 1.00 pm, BSE Sensex was trading at 59,171.10 down 387.23 points or 0.65% and Nifty50 at 17,669.05 down 110.95 points or 0.62%. Nifty Metal was trading at 5,803.00 up 23.30 points or 0.40%, after touching a high of 5,817.70 and low of 5,725.15 during intraday trade.

NALCO rose 2% at Rs118.35 per piece to lift the performance of the sector. 

Vedanta Limited rose nearly 2% at Rs349.70 per piece amid merger buzz with Vedanta Resources but the company denied the same.

NMDC was 1.5% higher at Rs152.80 per piece. The National Mineral Development Corporation Ltd (NMDC) has seen an over 28% increase in production yoy for the 10 month period (April to January) to 32.88 million tonne, while sales stood at 32.60 million tonne, up 25.34% y-o-y.

Hindustan Zinc was 1.4% higher while Jindal Steel also rose 1.27% to outperform. SAIL also advanced 1% to support the Index. 

APL Apollo Tubes shed 1.6% at Rs908.15 per piece to drag the most while Coal India was also under presssure at Rs163.85 per piece, down 0.85%.