Indian Shares End Choppy Session Modestly Lower

(RTTNews) - Indian shares ended a choppy session slightly lower on Friday as an AI-driven rally that boosted stocks earlier in the week fizzled out, Middle East tensions lingered, and the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) reduced its GDP forecast for FY27 after holding its policy rate steady.

Disappointing Broadcom results pressured tech stocks globally, keeping investors nervous.

On the geopolitical front, the U.S.-Iran-Israel conflict remained unresolved, despite the ceasefire and diplomacy.

Hezbollah rejected the latest ceasefire agreement between Israel and the Lebanese government, saying the "imaginary ceasefire" would amount to "a surrender, defeat and achieving the enemy's goals."

Elsewhere, Israeli ministers also refrained from approving the proposed ceasefire arrangement during a security cabinet meeting.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) eliminated Hezbollah's engineering unit commander Abed Harb, escalating tensions and throwing the future of the truce into an abyss.

Closer home, the RBI today left its key policy rates unchanged and upgraded its inflation outlook, citing higher oil prices and monsoon uncertainty.

The RBI has revised inflation outlook for the current year to 5.1 percent from 4.6 percent previously and warned of upside risks due to global supply chain disruptions, global commodity price shocks, uncertainty over south-west monsoon and El Niño conditions.

Real GDP growth for 2026-27 has now been pegged at 6.6 percent, down from the previous forecast of 6.9 percent.

Amid sustained foreign fund flows and weak cues from global markets, the BSE Sensex fluctuated before finishing 116.66 points, or 0.16 percent, lower at 74,243.34.

The NSE Nifty index dropped 49.85 points, or 0.21 percent, to 23,366.70 while the BSE mid-cap and small-cap indexes slid around 0.1 percent each.

The market breadth was weak on the BSE, with 2,139 shares falling while 2,057 shares advanced and 203 shares closed unchanged.

Among the prominent decliners, HDFC Bank, Reliance Industries, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Bharti Airtel, HCL Technologies, NTPC, Tata Steel, TCS and Trent fell 1-2 percent.