Indian shares post weekly losses despite Friday's rise

BENGALURU, Aug 4 (Reuters) - Indian shares closed higher on Friday, led by a bounceback in information technology (IT) stocks after their recent slide, while a report of a Blackstone investment in Cipla boosted pharma stocks.

The Nifty 50 (.NSEI) index closed 0.70% higher at 19,517, while the S&P BSE Sensex (.BSESN) rose 0.74% to 65,721.25.

Despite Fridays rise, the benchmarks extended losses for the second week in a row, losing 0.66% each as weak global cues, including a downgrade of the United States long-term foreign currency ratings and weak China data dampened mood.

On Friday, ten of the 13 sectoral indexes logged gains on the day, with IT (.NIFTYIT) rising 1.55% after U.S. technology and consulting firm Cognizant maintained its full-year revenue outlook and reported in-line results in second quarter of 2023.

\“While Cognizants revenue outlook is a positive for its Indian peers, the pressure on the sector is likely to persist due to spending cuts,\” said Hem Securities analyst Astha Jain, calling the rise in IT stocks this week a \“technical bounce after the recent sharp slide\”.

The IT index, which had lost nearly 5% over the last two weeks since quarterly earnings of major firms like TCS (TCS.NS), HCLTech (HCLT.NS), Wipro (WIPR.NS) and Infosys (INFY.NS), gained 3.21% this week.

Pharma stocks (.NIPHARM) gained 0.94%, led by Cipla (CIPL.NS) on a report that Blackstone was looking to buy a stake in the drug maker. Cipla was the top Nifty 50 gainer, adding 3.77%.

Broader markets mirrored the benchmarks, with the more domestically focused mid-caps (.NIFMDCP100) and small-caps (.NIFSMCP100) adding 0.82% and 0.76%, respectively.

\“The interest in broader markets is driven by cost efficiencies, higher sales volumes and operational improvements,\” said Rahul Sharma, head of technical research at Mumbai-based investment advisory firm Equity99.

Among individual stocks, Paytm (PAYT.NS) gained 3.78% after posting a strong operational update for July.

Zomato (ZOMT.NS) surged 10.23% after reporting a quarterly net profit for the first time ever.