Indian shares ended largely flat on Friday triggered by a worsening global growth outlook, and as losses in financial stocks such as Kotak Mahindra Bank Ltd offset gains in Maruti Suzuki India Ltd. The broader NSE index closed flat at 10,791.65, while the benchmark BSE index ended 0.07 percent lower at 35,871.48.
For the week, the NSE index added 0.6 percent, while the BSE index inched up about 0.2 percent.
Kotak Mahindra Bank pared early losses to finish nearly 4 percent weaker on reports that ING Group is looking to sell stake in the private-sector lender via a block deal. Stock posted its lowest closing level in over three weeks.
Maruti Suzuki India ended 1.6 percent higher.
ING Group is looking to sell a 1.21 percent stake in the private-sector lender for over 28 bln rupees ($393.43 mln) via a block deal, BloombergQuint reported, citing bankers involved in the deal.
Kotak Mahindra Bank shares posted their worst intraday fall since Dec. 10, giving up nearly 5 percent.
Market participants shrugged off the dovish comments from the Indian central bank.
Most of the six-member monetary policy committee of the Reserve Bank of India were in favour of spurring growth in Asia's third-largest economy amid a soft inflation outlook on a sustained fall in food prices, the minutes of the February monetary policy meeting released on Thursday showed.
The two-day rally was just a pull-back and now the downtrend is back. It is more of a stock-specific movement on Friday as there are no fixed triggers now, said A.K. Prabhakar, head of research, IDBI Capital in Mumbai.
Financials accounted for half the losses on the NSE index due to a plunge in Kotak Mahindra shares, while energy shares also lost some momentum.
Reliance Industries Ltd was among the top laggards on the index, declining as much as 1.5 percent. Bucking the broader trend, shares of Anil Ambani-owned Reliance group companies rose, with Reliance Communications Ltd surging as much as 20.5 percent.
Anil Ambani is planning to use a payment from his elder brother's company and the sale of real estate assets to pay what he owes to Sweden's Ericsson following a court ruling this week, a source familiar with the matter told Reuters on Thursday.
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