Sensex below 9600

Sensex that had surged over 1,100 points during the last five sessions witnessed a major sell-off today. Tracking weak Asian markets, Sensex was 146 points down at 9902 at the opening bell, and continued to fall all through the day. After plunging below 9600 mark to touch the day's low of 9521, Sensex moved within a range though with a negative bias. A spell of panic selling towards the close led Sensex close 480 points down at 9568 whereas Nifty shed 131 points to close at 2978.

Except consumer durables and health care that were marginally up, all other sectoral indices posted losses for the day. Banking and metals sectors were the worst hit, down 7-8% each, information technology, teck , capital goods power and public sector units sectors were down over 3-4% each.

Market breadth, the number of advancing shares to declining shares, was negative. Of the 2,473 stocks traded on BSE, 1,471 stocks declined, whereas 904 stocks advanced. Ninety eight stocks ended unchanged. Most of the index heavyweights ended in the red. JP Associates tumbled 12.34% at Rs78.50. ICICI Bank at Rs337.95, Tata Steel at Rs196.15, Reliance Infrastructure at Rs502.45, DLF at Rs165.55, State Bank of India at Rs1,022 and Tata Consultancy Services at Rs522.75 fell by around 9-12% each. Among other major losers, Hindalco Industries dropped 8.81% at Rs50.20, Tata Motors lost 8.74% at Rs172.30, HDFC fell 8.72% at Rs1,450.55 and Reliance Communications declined by 8.70% at Rs167.85. National Thermal Power Corporation, however, bucked the downtrend and gained 0.80% at Rs183.50. Sun Pharmaceutical Industries was up 0.25% at Rs1,079.50.

Banking stocks were among the worst hit. Kotak Bank dropped 11.02% at Rs268.45, Punjab National Bank slumped 9.97% at Rs397.15, Yes Bank shed 9.59% at Rs49.95 and Axis Bank slipped by 7.84% at Rs397.40. Bank of Baroda, Federal Bank, Union Bank, Indian Overseas Bank, Karnataka Bank, Bank of India and Oriental Bank of Commerce also ended weak.

Over 1.63 crore shares of Cals Refineries changed hands on BSE followed by Reliance Natural Resources (1.31 crore shares), Unitech (1.21 crore shares), S Kumars (98.56 lakh shares) and Suzlon Energy (79 lakh shares).