Sensex, Nifty Set To Open Lower; Tata Motors, GAIL India In Focus

The Indian equity benchmarks are set to open lower in trade on Tuesday as indicated by the Nifty futures traded on the Singapore Exchange. The Nifty futures on Singapore Exchange also known as the SGX Nifty was down 16 points at 14,480. Meanwhile, Asian stocks were mostly lower on Tuesday, tracking Wall Street declines as political turmoil in Washington and rising coronavirus cases worldwide weighed on sentiment.

Political uncertainty dominated trading as House Democrats introduced a resolution to impeach U.S. President Donald Trump, accusing him of inciting insurrection following a violent attack on the Capitol last week.

Several big tech giants, including Twitter Inc, Amazon.com Inc , Alphabet Inc, Facebook Inc and Apple Inc, have taken actions against Trump and his network of supporters, as concerns mounted over the risk of continued violence.

Investors also kept an eye on the continued spread of the coronavirus globally as cases surpassed 90 million on Monday, according to a Reuters tally.

Japan's Nikkei slipped 0.48 per cent, South Korea's KOSPI fell 0.91 per cent and Hong Kong's Hang Seng index futures lost 0.54 per cent.

Back home, Tata Motors will be in focus as Jaguar Land Rover's retail sales for the quarter ended December 31, 2020 stood at 128,469 vehicles, 13.1 per cent higher than 113,569 vehicles sold in the preceding quarter, but down 9.0 per cent compared to the same period last year.

Dr. Reddy's Laboratories said the independent Data and Safety Monitoring Board (DSMB) has reviewed the safety data from the phase 2 clinical trial of the Sputnik V vaccine, and recommended phase 3 recruitment and continuation of the clinical trial without any modifications.

GAIL India's board meeting is scheduled on January 15 to consider the proposal of buyback of shares and declaration of interim dividend for the financial year 2020-21.