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Indian stock markets saw a decline after blue chips Infosys and Hindustan Unilever reported disappointing earnings, ending a record six-day run. The NSE Nifty fell 1.17% to 19,745 and the BSE Sensex declined 1.31% to 66,684.26. Shares in IT firms such as Infosys plummeted after the company cut its revenue growth outlook; the Nifty IT index saw its biggest single-day decline since 17 April, falling 4.1%. Despite foreign portfolio investors pumping around INR85,000 crore ($11.5bn) into Indian equities since March, FPIs were net sellers of INR1,998.77 crore on Friday.

Infosys saw a share plunge of 7.7% after the company cut its FY24 revenue guidance from 4-7% to 1-3.5%, resulting in an industry-wide sell-off that saw the NSE IT index fall 4.1%. Jefferies, Nomura, Bank of America Securities, Motilal Oswal Financial Services, Nuvama Institutional Equities and HSBC cut earnings estimates as a result.

During the week, as many as 68 smallcap stocks delivered double-digit weekly returns with four of them offering over 25% returns. DCM Shriram Industries was the top gainer in the smallcap pack with nearly 32% return, followed by Sterling and Wilson (26.6%), Arihant Capital (26.55%), and DB Corp (25.03%).

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The Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) wants to make it mandatory for foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) to provide their legal entity identifier (LEI) code, further boosting the KYC framework for overseas investors buying into Indian financial assets.

Last year, the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi) had issued an advisory to investment banks, asking them to furnish either an affidavit from such a family member or members, clearly stating they do not want to be classified as part of the promoter group, or a memorandum of understanding (MoU) between the promoter and the family member.

While investors broadly anticipate the central bank will raise rates by 25 basis points at its July 26 meeting, many also hope for signs that policymakers are more confident inflation will continue cooling, eliminating the need for the Fed to lift borrowing costs much further and supporting the thesis that has helped buoy stocks in recent weeks.

HUL shares have underperformed the market in the past year with the stock remaining flat as against the 27% gains in the Nifty FMCG index and the 18% upmove in the benchmark Nifty. ITC shares surged 64% in this period.

The drop in net worth to $234.4 billion is the seventh-largest decline ever among those in the Bloomberg Billionaires Index, and further narrows the wealth gap between Musk and Bernard Arnault, the world’s two richest people. Musk’s fortune still exceeds that of Arnault, chairman of luxury goods maker LVMH, by about $33 billion.

Italian pencil maker Fabbrica Italiana Lapis ed Affini SpA (Fila), which holds a 51% stake in Indian stationary maker DOMS, has approved an initial public offering (IPO) of the latter. Fila has committed to selling €90m ($99m) worth of shares in DOMS while staying on as the largest shareholder after the IPO. The listing is scheduled to close by the end of 2019.