Equity indices open in green; SBI shares down 1%

Equity markets on Monday opened in green marginally but soon after it started trading down. BSE Sensex opened at 26,633.12 while NSE Nifty 8,164.90.

At 0925 hours, Sensex was trading at 26,565.38, down 61.08 points, or 0.23%. At the same time, Nifty was trading at 8,173, down 12.80 points, or 0.16%.

Sector-wise, banking sector was 68.74, or 0.33% down. 

On 30-share benchmark, among the top gainers were, Dr Reddy's Lab (0.41%), NTPC (0.39%), Larsen & Toubro (0.34%), Wipro (0.30%) and Coal India (0.30%). Among losers were State Bank of India (-1.56%), HDFC (-1.47%), Bajaj Auto (-1.36%), ICICI Bank (-1.04%) and Hero Moto Corp (-0.91).

On Sunday, various banks had announced the MCLR rate cut as the banks were flooded with liquidity post demonetisation drive, which ended on December 31.

State Bank of India on Sunday reduced its marginal cost of funds based lending rate (MCLR) by 90 basis points across maturities. Apart from SBI, state-owned IDBI Bank had also cut in its MCLR by 30-60 bps.

At 0930 hours, the shares of SBI were trading at Rs 246.60 per piece, down 1.26%, or Rs 3.15 on BSE. 

Similarly, state-run Punjab National Bank also slashed its lending rates across maturities ranging from overnight to five years with the new rates effective from Sunday. 

The banks announcement also came in after on Saturday, Prime Minister Narendra Modi in an address to nation announced a series of incentives on home loans for poor and medium class people and other offers for small businesses.