Panic selling halts resurgence

Panic selling in noon trades triggered a major correction after the market had witnessed gains of more than 300 points in the first half. Continuing with the buoyancy, the Sensex resumed the day with a positive gap of 264 points at 9,799. Fast moving consumer goods’ stocks buying fuelled a major rally in early trades and the index zoomed above the 9,830 mark to touch a new intra-day high of 9,836. While the market stood firm thereafter, a sudden spurt in selling activities, particularly in banking, consumer goods, auto and metal stocks dragged the index just above 9,300 level to the day's low of 9,267. The Sensex finally wrapped the session with losses of 1.58% or 151 points at 9,385, while Nifty dropped 38 points to close at 2,810.

As the market fell sharply, the market breadth was negative. Of the 2,591 stocks traded on BSE, 1,582 stocks declined, whereas 937 stocks advanced. Seventy two stocks ended unchanged. Of the 13 sectoral indices trading on BSE, 12 indices ended in the red while BSE FMCG was the only gaining sectoral index for the day ending 0.07% higher at 1,907.

Dragging the Sensex, ACC lost 8.95% at Rs418.60, Tata Motors dropped 8.49% at Rs136.95, Tata Steel fell 6.40% at Rs173.25, HDFC declined 4.86% at Rs1,558.20 and Jaiprakash Associates tumbled 4.67% at Rs73.50. Reliance Infrastructure, Larsen & Toubro, Bharat Heavy Electricals Ltd, Sterlite Industries, Maruti, Mahindra & Mahindra, Infosys Technologies, ONGC, Grasim Industries and Wipro were down by nearly 2-4% each. However, Bharti Airtel advanced 2.99% at Rs650.15, Tata Power scaled up 2.02% at Rs746.40, Reliance Communications added 1.88% at Rs219.75, HDFC Bank gained 0.37% at Rs1,011.60, Hindustan Unilever, ITC and Hindalco Industries closed with marginal gains.

Consumer goods stocks declined sharply. Everest Kanto Cylinder crashed 10.97% at Rs170.90, Crompton Greaves dropped 9.18% at Rs140.90, Praj Industries lost 7.34% at Rs70.10 and Reliance Industries shed 5.62% at Rs354.45.Thermax, Punj Llyod, Suzlon Energy, Alstom Projects India slipped marginally.

Over 2.10 crore shares of GVK Power and Infrastructure changed hands on the BSE followed by Suzlon Energy (1.66 crore shares), Tata Teleservices (1.65 crore shares), Cals Refineries (95 lakh shares) and Reliance Natural Resources (79 lakh shares).