Not a good day for markets

The Sensex opened at 14,647, slightly below (31 points down) its previous close, but lost more than 150 points in the first hour of trading itself. The slide continued, almost unabated, thereafter on the back of frenzied selling, and the index touched the lowest of the day 14,201 (477 points down its yesterday’s close) about half an hour before the closing. The Sensex wrapped the day with losses of 435 points at 14,244, while the Nifty shed 132 points to close at 4,284.

The market breadth was negative, as of the 2,713 stocks traded on the BSE 71% stocks (1,915 stocks) declined, while only 27% stocks (733 stocks) advanced. The remaining 2% stocks (65 stocks) ended unchanged.

All the 13 sectoral indices slipped sharply. The BSE Bankex dropped 5.16%, the BSE Realty index shed 5.05%, the BSE PSU index declined 3.71%, the BSE Power index dropped 3.27%, the BSE CG index was down 2.95% and the BSE Metal index declined 2.47%. The remaining indices slid 1-2% each.

Most of the index stalwarts witnessed considerable correction. Among the banking stocks, State Bank of India tumbled 7.10% at Rs1,342.25 and HDFC Bank dropped 5.82% at Rs1,165.80. Among the other major losers, NTPC lost 5.68% at Rs173.50, DLF slumped 5.55% at Rs481.60, Reliance Infrastructure slipped 5.45% at Rs954.70, ICICI Bank shed 5.19% at Rs643.10, Jaiprakash Associates lost 4.78% at Rs163.20 and HDFC fell 4.41% at Rs2,209.55. Other front-line stocks lost between 2%-3% each. Select counters however bucked the downtrend and ended with gains. One such bourse was Ranbaxy Laboratories, which ended 1.53% higher at Rs513.40.

In terms of turnover, over 1.52 crore Reliance Natural Resources shares changed hands on the BSE followed by Chambal Fertilisers & Chemicals (1.32 crore shares), Dish TV (1.02 crore shares), Ispat Industries (78.59 lakh shares) and Nagarjuna Fertlisers & Chemicals (69.63 lakh shares).