Sensex plummets 435 pts as bears strike back

Sensex down, BSE

After a weak start this morning, the market kept losing ground as the session progressed as the bears, who had taken a breather yesterday, swung back into action once again.

Stockometer | Top gainers | Worst losers

With global markets turning weak and crude oil prices inching higher, investors were in no mood to build up positions this morning. Fears of interest rates hardening further on the back of high inflation and lower growth appeared to have weighed in significantly in afternoon trade.

While the Sensex, which tanked to a low of 14,201.18 in late afternoon trade, ended with a loss of 434.50 points or 2.96% at 14,243.73, the Nifty closed lower by 131.90 points or 2.99% at 4283.85, a few points off a low of 4271.30.

Interest rate sensitive bank and realty stocks took a severe hammering. Mirroring the sell-off in these sectors, the Bankex and Realty indices tumbled by 5.16% and 5.05% respectively.

PSU, power, capital goods, metal, media & communications and information technology stocks too declined sharply. Reflecting their fall, the respective sectoral indices drifted down by 2% - 3.75% today. The Oil & Gas barometer slipped by 1.94%. HC and Auto indices lost around 1.5% each while the Consumer Durables and FMCG indices eased by around a per cent.

Midcap and smallcap stocks also attracted heavy selling and mirroring their decline, the BSE Midcap and Smallcap indices lost 2.04% and 1.83% respectively.

The market breadth was very weak today. Out of 2713 stocks traded on BSE, 1914 stocks finished on a negative note. 734 stocks posted gains and 65 stocks ended flat.

Ranbaxy Laboratories (up 1.55% to Rs 513.40) was the lone gainer from the Sensex pack. Among Nifty stocks, besides Ranbaxy Laboratories, Cairn India (1.8%) and ABB (0.15%) were the ones to end on a positive note.

State Bank of India closed with a big loss of 7.1%. HDFC Bank and ICICI Bank, the other banking sector heavyweights in the Sensex, went down by 5.8% and 5.15% respectively.

NTPC, DLF, Reliance Infrastructure, Jaiprakash Associates and HDFC lost 4% - 6%. Reliance Communications, BHEL, Hindalco, Larsen & Toubro, Grasim Industries, ACC, Wipro, Hindustan Unilever, Tata Consultancy Services, Tata Steel, ONGC and Infosys Technologies eased by 2% - 4%.

Bharti Airtel, Mahindra & Mahindra, Reliance Industries, Sterlite Industries, Tata Motors, Maruti Suzuki and Satyam Computer Services also closed on a weak note.

Nalco, Unitech, BPCL, Tata Communications, Suzlon Energy, Sun Pharmaceuticals, Punjab National Bank, Ambuja Cements, HCL Technologies, SAIL, Reliance Petroleum and Idea Cellular ended sharply lower.

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