Pharma shares witnessed buying demand for fourth consecutive trading sessions.
At 12:25 IST, the barometer index, the S&P BSE Sensex advanced 38.99 points or 0.05% to 85,759.37. The Nifty 50 index added 5.05 points or 0.02% to 26,220.60.
In the broader market, the S&P BSE Mid-Cap index shed 0.07% and the S&P BSE Small-Cap index fell 0.13%.
The market breadth was almost even. On the BSE,1,960 shares rose and 1,950 shares fell. A total of 219 shares were unchanged.
Derivatives:
The NSE's India VIX, a gauge of the market's expectation of volatility over the near term, fell 4.80% to 11.24. The Nifty 30 December 2025 futures were trading at 26,401.10, at a premium of 180.5 points as compared with the spot at 26,220.60.
The Nifty option chain for the 30 December 2025 expiry showed a maximum call OI of 60.1 lakh contracts at the 26,000 strike price. Maximum put OI of 73.5 lakh contracts was seen at 26,000 strike price.
Buzzing Index:
The Nifty Pharma index advanced 0.38% to 22,948.50. The index jumped 2.03% in the four consecutive trading sessions.
Laurus Labs (up 2.45%), Ipca Laboratories (up 2.06%), Ajanta Pharma (up 0.76%), Glenmark Pharmaceuticals (up 0.58%), Sun Pharmaceutical Industries (up 0.57%), Lupin (up 0.51%), Alkem Laboratories (up 0.49%), Zydus Lifesciences (up 0.34%), Abbott India (up 0.32%) and Biocon (up 0.29%) advanced.
Stocks in Spotlight:
Ashoka Buildcon declined 3.37% after National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) temporarily suspended the company from participating in ongoing/future bids for one month or until an expert committee completes its investigation.
Newgen Software Technologies rose 0.21%. The company has secured an international contract from a leading bank in Malaysia to provide end-to-end project management services for an enterprise content management (ECM) system.
SEPC declined 1.37%. The company said it has bagged an AED 35,000,000 (Rs 85 crore) contract through its UAE arm, SEPC FZE, for a strategic energy infrastructure upgrade project in the United Arab Emirates.