Sensex tumbles on weak global trends, selling in realty, IT

The Bombay Stock Exchange benchmark Sensex on Thursday saw a one-month low before ending with a loss of over 323 points mostly due to funds selling realty and information technology stocks.
    
The Sensex, which remained under pressure and dipped below 9,000, ended with a loss of 323.75 points at 9,046.74. It touched the day's low of 8,946.62 points, a level last seen on December 5, 2008.
    
The 50-share National Stock Exchange index fell to the day's low of 2,701.75 before ending with a loss of 98.60 points at 2,736.70.
    
Selling pressure gathered momentum on weak global trends after leading IT companies providing software back-up to Canada-based Nortel, which has filed a bankruptcy petition, fell sharply.
    
Realty stocks were down after Maytas Infra, promoted by the family of tainted former Satyam chairman B Ramalinga Raju, fell by another five per cent and got stuck at the lower circuit for the sixth consecutive trading session on news that a high-level probe would be ordered into the projects sanctioned to the firm.
    
Marketmen said leading software companies, led by Infosys, Wipro, and TCS, which provide software back-up to the collapsing Nortel Network Corporation, pulled down software stocks.
    
They said Nortel made the bankruptcy filing a day before a USD 107 million interest payment was due and was granted protection at the Ontario Superior Court.
     
US retail sales dropping for the sixth month in a row, shrinking by 2.7 per cent in December, was an additional dampening factor in the global equity markets, they added.