India's Adani Ports to replace Wipro in Sensex after BSE rejig

FILE PHOTO: The Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) building is seen lit up for Diwali, the Hindu festival of lights, in Mumbai

By Bharath Rajeswaran

BENGALURU (Reuters) -India's Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone will replace Wipro in the 30-stock blue-chip S&P BSE Sensex, the operator of the index said on Friday.

The BSE, in its semi-annual rebalancing exercise, included the country's largest private port operator, making it the first Adani Group company to join the Sensex, effective June 24.

The Sensex ended the session muted ahead of the announcement. [.BO]

Two Adani Group companies - Adani Enterprises and Adani Ports are already part of the other benchmark index NSE Nifty 50.

Adani Ports could see inflows of $252 million after inclusion into the Sensex, while Wipro will likely witness outflows worth $161 million, said Abhilash Pagaria, head of Nuvama Alternative and Quantitative Research.

Adani Ports' inclusion into the Sensex came on the same day when shares of Adani Enterprises recovered in intraday trade to levels last seen in January 2023, before a report by Hindenburg Research triggered a sell-off in Gautam Adani's ports-to-power conglomerate.

Since that report, Adani Ports and Adani Power have been the best-performing group stocks, rising 86.04% and 157.4%, respectively. They were also the first two Adani companies to bounce back from the drop.

Earlier in May, Adani Ports posted a 76% rise in its fourth-quarter profit, helped by record cargo volumes.

Its stock has jumped 6% this week, its best weekly performance since early February.

Besides the Sensex rejig, REC, HDFC Asset Management, Canara Bank, Cummins India and Punjab National Bank have been included in the BSE 100 index.

The stocks replaced in that index are Page Industries, SBI Cards and Payment Services, ICICI Prudential Life Insurance, Jubilant FoodWorks and Zee Entertainment Enterprises.

(Reporting by Bharath Rajeswaran in Bengaluru; Editing by Sohini Goswami and Varun H K)