Mumbai, Sep 22 : The Indian benchmark indices opened marginally lower on Friday, despite positive global cues, with IT stocks leading losses owing to some concerns over the new US H-1B visa rules.

As of 9.26 am, the Sensex was down 189 points, or 0.23 per cent at 82,772 and the Nifty was down 40 points, or 0.16 per cent at 25,286. Sensex and Nifty had opened with dips of 0.40 per cent and 0.33 per cent respectively, but later cut down on the losses.

IT giants such as Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Infosys, Wipro, HCL Technologies, Tech Mahindra, and Coforge slipped in the morning trade.

The US government has clarified that visa holders returning to the country are exempt from the new $100,000 fee, which provided marginal relief to Indian IT companies.

White House said the visa fee would be a one-time payment, applicable only to new applications from the next lottery cycle (March'April 2026), and not on renewals.

The broad cap indices Nifty Midcap 100 dipped 0.05 per cent, and the Nifty Smallcap 100 lost 0.12 per cent.

The losers were Tech Mahindra, TCS, Tata Motors, Apollo Hospitals and Dr Reddy's Labs.

Among sectoral indices, Nifty IT, the top loser, lost 2.68 per cent. Nifty Pharma (down 0.45 per cent) and Nifty Healthcare (down 0.33 per cent) also weighed down on the indices. All other sectoral indices were trading with marginal gains.

The Nifty index has held firmly above the 25,300 mark, closing at 25,327 in the previous session. It continues to trade above its key moving averages'the 20-day, 50-day, and 200-day EMAs'reaffirming the broader bullish undertone.

Analysts predicted that sentiment will remain positive as long as the index remains above these averages. Immediate resistance is placed at 25,500, followed by the 25,600 and 25,850 zones. The support lies at 25,150 and 25,000 zones.

They said that the market is likely to exhibit mixed behaviour, with the IT sector being affected by the H-1B visa issue and domestic consumption themes responding positively to the potential increase in consumption from lower GST rates kicking in from today.

According to them, the present low interest rate regime will aid the consumption boost and will also facilitate an increase in credit demand, boosting the profitability of financials.

Asia-Pacific markets mostly rose on Monday, tracking Wall Street's gains from Friday and boosted by China's key lending rate decision that kept key rates unchanged.

In the US markets, Nasdaq has added 0.72 per cent, the S&P 500 edged up 0.49 per cent, and the Dow inched up 0.37 per cent in the last trading session.

Most of the Asian markets were trading in the green during the morning session. While China's Shanghai index edged up 0.07 per cent, and Shenzhen advanced 0.17 per cent, Japan's Nikkei added 1.45 per cent, while Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index lost 0.82 per cent. South Korea's Kospi added 1.06 per cent.

On Friday, foreign institutional investors (FIIs) purchased equities worth Rs 390 crore, while domestic institutional investors (DIIs) were net buyers of equities worth Rs 2,105 crore.

/IANS