Below 11k again

The Sensex had witnessed a pull back in the last two days and had surged around 1,000 points on a strong buying support. However, the bears hit back strongly and triggered a major sell-off in the market during the intra-day trades. Tracking subdued Asian markets, the Sensex began the session below its previous close and continued to slide on sustained selling in frontline stocks. After plunging below the 11,000 mark to touch the day's low of 10,760, the market moved within a range with a negative bias. The market witnessed panic selling towards the close and the Sensex ended the session with a loss of 674 points at 10,809 whereas Nifty shed 180 points to close at 3,338.

All the 13 sectoral indices ended lower. The BSE CG and BSE CD dropped over 8% each, while BSE Metal, BSE Teck, BSE Power, BSE IT, BSE Oil & Gas were down over 5-7% each.

The breadth of the market was extremely negative. Of the 2,655 stocks traded on the BSE, 2,117 stocks declined whereas 499 stocks advanced. Thirty nine stocks ended unchanged. All the Sensex stocks ended in the red. JP Associates was a major loser and tumbled by 14.47% at Rs72.70. Reliance Communications at Rs235.80, Reliance Infrastructure at Rs555.70, Larsen & Toubro at Rs893.15, Tata Steel at Rs273.25, Sterlite Industries at Rs292.15 slumped over 10-12% each. Among the other major losers Tata Consultancy Services dropped 8.46% at Rs542.05, ICICI Bank lost 7.36% at Rs414.20, HDFC fell 6.90% at Rs1,712.60 and Hindalco Industries declined by 6.70% at Rs79.40.

Capital goods stocks lost ground on profit taking. Areva T&D India dropped 14.37% at Rs903.95, Punj Lloyd slumped 13.30% at Rs186.10, Crompton Greaves shed 12.65% at Rs191.65 and Thermax slipped by 12.12% at Rs299.75. Usha Martin, Walchand, Elecon Engineering Company and Suzlon Energy also ended weak.

Strong buying was evident in several small-cap stocks. Binayak Tex Processors at Rs22.25 and Maharashtra Polybutenes at Rs74.35 hit their new highs.

Over 1.05 crore Core Project and Technologies shares changed hands on the BSE followed by Reliance Natural Resources (0.92 crore shares), Cals Refineries (0.76 crore shares), IFCI (0.58 crore shares) and JP Associates (0.44 crore shares).