Sensex sinks on sustained selloff

The market breadth continued to be highly negative as all the BSE Sectoral indices closed in the red.

There is no respite for the Indian market from relentless selling, with the BSE Sensex falling by more than 300 points and the NSE Nifty sliding below 5,900 in intraday trade before recouping some losses.



The broader market actually did much worse than the frontline counters, extending this week's steep losses in the wake of a spate of scams and other bad news involving alleged stock manipulation a few small-cap and mid-cap companies.

Metals, Banking, Real Estate and Consumer Durables indices on the BSE slid by more than 2% each while the BSE PSU and Capital Goods index were down 1% apiece. The BSE Auto index too lost nearly 1%.

Oil & Gas, Pharma and FMCG shares, which had been holding firm in the morning trade, slipped marginally.

In Asia, most markets closed lower, with the Shanghai Composite in China down nearly 1% and the Hang Seng dropping 1.4%. The Nikkei in Tokyo managed modest gains on the back of some weakness in the yen.

European markets recovered some of the lost ground after a shaky start.

The Sensex ended at 19,696, down 238 points from the previous close. It had earlier been as low as 19,611 and as high as 19,875 after opening at 19,874.

The NSE Nifty was down 73 points at 5,903 after touching a day's low of 5,878 and a day's high of 5,960. It had opened at 5,954.

ACC, BPCL and Ranbaxy were the only notable gainers in the two main indices. ONGC and Tata Motors managed to close in the positive terrain as did Gail India and Dr. Reddy's.

On the other hand, Axis Bank, IDFC, Reliance Capital, RCOM, JP Associates, HDFC Bank, DLF, SAIL, Hindalco, Bajaj Auto, Tata Steel, HDFC, Hero Honda, SBI and Reliance Power were the big losers.

The BSE Small-Cap index was down 3.2% while the BSE Mid-Cap index was down 2.2%.

The market breadth on the BSE was negative, with 2,319 shares declining and just 595 shares rising.