Sensex plunges 165 points; IT, realty stocks take big hit

The Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) Sensex plunged 165 points today to 17,847, a nine-week low, on selling in capital goods, IT and realty stocks ahead of May's settlement of derivative contracts amid weak global cues.

Intra-day, it dipped to three month low of 17,786.13.

Infosys, L&T, RIL, TCS, SBI, ICICI Bank and HDFC contributed more than 100 points to the decline.

Realty major DLF slumped to a 52-week low after posting over 19% dip in Q4 earnings and was the top loser from the Sensex pack, losing 4.04%.

The capital goods index fell 1.53%. It was followed by IT, down 1.52%, on reports that software bellwether Infosys Tech has received a legal notice from US district court over the use of its business visas.

Globally, stocks displayed mixed trend with downward bias on fears that euro-zone debt crisis may spread further.

Stock markets resumed lower amid weak Asian trend and the 30-share BSE index, Sensex, touched the lowest level since the Budget day (February 28), when it had logged an intra-trade low of 17.718.88.

It remained in the negative terrain all through and closed at 17,847.24, down 164.73 points or 0.91%.

The broad-based NSE 50 index, Nifty, also dipped 45.90 points or 0.85% to 5,348.95.

"It was a day of large-cap led selling as traders braced for Thursday's F&O expiry and earnings from a few index heavyweights like Tata Steel and Tata Motors," said IIFL head of research (India Private Clients) Amar Ambani.

"Weak Asian markets weighed on the sentiment early on, and couldn't recover despite a recovery in the European indices," he added.

Stock markets have been under pressure most of this year, about 12% down so far, due to high inflation, soaring oil prices, rising interest rates and below-expected fourth quarter earnings by key corporates.

In Asia, key indices in China, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan closed in the red. Hong Kong and Singapore indices, however, closed in the green.

European stocks moved narrow range in afternoon deals.

FIIs, meanwhile, turned net buyers after eight days of sell-off and picked up shares worth Rs188.16 crore yesterday as per provisional data.

Overall, 25 out of 30 Sensex scrips closed in the red, while others finished in the green. Reliance Com dropped 2.48%, L&T (2.24%), TCS (2.09%), SBI (2.06%), Infosys Tech (1.76%), Tata Power (1.68%), Jaipra Asso (1.56%), BHEL (1.47%), Bajaj Auto (1.46%), REL Infra (1.40%), Hindalco (1.23%), ONGC (1.09%), HUL (0.93%), Wipro (0.93%) and RIL (0.92%).

Among other sectoral indices, BSE-Realty tumbled by 1.31% and Oil & Gas by 0.98%, while Consumer Durable was up 1.23%.

The total market breadth at BSE remained negative with 1,649 stocks losing ground, against 1,080 closing with gains. The total turnover improved further to Rs2,885.74 crore from Rs2,607.78 crore yesterday.