World goes for a toss…Sensex tumbles over 200 pts

History repeats itself, they say. That adage has been true for the Indian stock market for quite some time now, with the key indices failing to break out of the current range after coming close to a break out. Today was no different, just when the bulls thought they could breach 5400 and head further up came the bolt from China.




As a result, the Indian markets ended with a sharp cut led by a sell-off in the global equity markets. The benchmark indices started off on a weak note. "The NSE Nifty hovered around 5300 for major part of the first half. However, sentiment turned sour after the Shanghai Composite index in China plunged, hitting a 14-month low amid worries over its future growth prospects," says Amar Ambani Vice President Research IIFL.

In addition, a weak start to the markets in Europe and some offloading in index heavyweights like Hindalco, RCom, Tata Steel and Reliance Infra dragged the Nifty below 5300 at close.

The BSE 30-share Sensex fell 240 points to close at 17,534 and Nifty lost 78 points to end at 5,256.

Asian markets ended in the red, Japan's Nikkei Average slipped 1.3%, while the Hang Seng lost 2.3%. China’s Shanghai Composite Index lost 4.2% while Australia’s S&P/ASX 200 Index slipped 0.9%.

European stocks were also in the negative terrain, FTSE index in UK was down 2%, CAC index in France was down 2.6% and DAX index in Germany lost 2.2%.

All the BSE sectoral indices ended in the red, BSE Metal index was the top loser, the index lost 2.8% followed by BSE Realty index, which was down 1.5% and BSE Banking index was down 1.5%. Even, BSE Mid-Cap index and the BSE Small-Cap index ended lower by 0.6% each.

Outside the frontline indices, the big losers in the broader market were Koutons Retail, Max India, Aditya Birla Nuvo, Balrampur Chini and Exide Ind. On the other hand, gainers included Aban, PFC, Cummins India and Container Corp.