BENGALURU, Jan 19 (Reuters) - Indian stocks were trading lower on Thursday after two straight sessions of gains, as weak U.S. economic data and hawkish comments from the U.S. Federal Reserve weighed on sentiment.

The Nifty 50 index was down 0.31% at 18,108.85 as of 10:45 a.m. IST, while the S&P BSE Sensex declined 0.27% to 60,878.62.

"The crucial issue influencing equity markets globally is whether the U.S. will succeed in containing inflation without falling into a recession," said V K Vijayakumar, Chief Investment Strategist at Geojit Financial Services.

"When data indicates a possible recession, U.S. markets go down and all other markets are impacted."

U.S. data showed retail sales fell the most in a year in December, while manufacturing output recorded its biggest drop in nearly two years.

Fed policymakers on Wednesday signalled they will push on with more interest rate hikes, even as inflation shows signs of having peaked and economic activity is slowing.

In domestic trading, most of the 13 Nifty sectoral indexes were in the negative territory, with metal stocks among the worst decliners, falling over 1%, after two straight sessions of gains.

"Metals have benefited on hopes of demand recovery from China, re-opening its borders, and now we are seeing some profit booking in the sector," said Siddhartha Khemka, head of research (retail) at Motilal Oswal Financial Services.

Hindustan Unilever Ltd and Asian Paints were down 1% and 0.4% higher, respectively, ahead of their quarterly earnings results later in the day. Investors will look for commentary on the impact of inflation on demand.

Private lender IndusInd Bank rose 1.8% after it reported a bigger-than-expected jump in third-quarter profit on Wednesday. ($1 = 81.4400 Indian rupees) (Reporting by Rama Venkat and Bharath Rajeswaran in Bengaluru; Editing by Nivedita Bhattacharjee )