BENGALURU, Jan 21 (Reuters) - Indian shares on Friday logged
their biggest weekly drop since late November as losses in
technology and financial stocks outweighed the boost from
consumer goods giant Hindustan Unilever's positive earnings.
The blue-chip NSE Nifty 50 index fell 0.79% to
17,617.15 and the S&P BSE Sensex dropped 0.72% to
59,037.18. The indexes had earlier declined as much as 1.5% to
their lowest since early-January.
They posted a weekly loss of about 3.5% each, having fallen
for four straight sessions on heavy selling from foreign
investors.
Asian and European peers, as well as U.S. stock futures,
were weaker as concerns over inflation and the Federal Reserve's
policy tightening weighed on sentiment.
However, Saurabh Mukherjea, founder of Marcellus Investment
Managers, said the drop was not unusual amid economic recovery
and that he was not too concerned about the correction.
"We are getting strong economic recovery globally, and
naturally that is fueling inflation, also because COVID-19 has
created supply side disruptions. That will invariably lead to
rate hikes, which signals that the first one-third of an
economic recovery is behind us."
The Nifty IT index lost 1.7% on Friday, its fifth
straight session of losses, to post a weekly decline of 7.1%.
The drop this week was its biggest since March 2020.
Bajaj Finserv, a holding company for financial
services businesses, slid 5.4% and was the biggest decliner on
the Nifty 50. It had ended lower on Thursday after posting a
decline in quarterly profit.
Shares of Hindustan Unilever rose 2.8% after the
consumer goods giant logged a rise in quarterly profit and its
margins beat analyst estimates.
Automakers Maruti Suzuki India and Bajaj Auto
gained 1.9% and 3.4%, respectively.
Reliance Industries closed flat ahead of its
quarterly results.
(Reporting by Chris Thomas in Bengaluru; additional reporting
by Gaurav Dogra; editing by Aditya Soni)