Monday, August 7 2006 16:52 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Mumbai: The market remained subdued in the early afternoon trade today (Aug 7, 2006) on the back of weak global trends and concerns over the domestic interest rate hikes.

The Bombay Stock Exchange's 30-share benchmark Sensex was hovering near the 10,800-point mark, down about 60 points from the previous close, after slipping to an intraday low of 10,783.00 earlier in the trading session.

Selling pressure was seen on a host of IT, energy, healthcare, auto and engineering counters, while selective buying was seen in the banking, consumer durables and FMCG sectors.

Engineering and construction major L&T, IT majors Wipro, Satyam and TCS, Hero Honda, Bharti, ONGC, Reliance Communications, Reliance Industries and Dr Reddy's Labs were trading with losses, while ICICI Bank, Bhel, NTPC, HLL and Reliance Energy were among the few Sensex scrips trading in the positive territory.

The market breadth was also negative with more than 50 per cent of the total BSE scrips trading in the red. On the Sensex, 22 scrips were trading in the red and eight were in the positive territory.

Asian stock markets were also trading on a subdued note after a weaker-than-expected job data in the US raised concerns about a potential slowdown in the world's largest economy.

The US markets had closed in the negative territory on Friday last week.

The market observers said the market sentiments would remain cautious ahead of the US Federal Reserve meeting tomorrow to decide on the future course of action on the interest rates.