Wipro shares drop by 6 percent after reduced quarterly profit amid moonlighting debate

The leading provider of IT services reported a fall in profit for the September quarter, which led to a more than 6 per cent decline in Wipro shares on Thursday.

The share price dropped in the morning session by 6.18 per cent to 382.55 on the BSE and 6.20 per cent to 382.60 on the NSE.

The stock of the company fell in early trade on both exchanges to its respective 52-week low. 381.50 and 381.30 were the intraday lows on the BSE and NSE, respectively.

On Wednesday, Wipro announced a 9.3 per cent decrease in net profit for the September quarter, coming in at Rs 2,659 crore. The same stood at 2,930.6 crores during the same period last year.

On a sequential basis, however, earnings increased in the reviewed quarter by 3.72 per cent from 2,563.6 crores in the June quarter prior.

The benchmark 30-share Sensex was down more than 443 points at 57,182.28 points in morning trade on generally negative investor sentiment.

This could be a result of a recent step taken by Wipro over moonlighting where the company removed around 300 employees. Rishad Premji, chairman of Wipro, described the practise as "cheating," drawing attention to the IT sector as the company's 300 employees were fired immediately. 

(With inputs from PTI)