Out of sorts, markets buckle

Nervousness gripped the market for the fourth consecutive session, as selling pressure since early trades saw the index remain weak all through the trading session. Although the Sensex resumed 108 points above its previous close at 14432 and moved up to touch an early high of 14433, the market soon snapped gains owing to the emergence of selling pressure. As correction continued unabated, the index tumbled below the mark to touch the intra-day low of 13,971 by end of the trade. While the market languished in negative territory through the noon trades, the Sensex signed off the session with a loss of 187 points at 14107. The Nifty also ended in the red at 4191, down 75 points.

The market breadth was weak, as of the 2,739 stocks traded on the BSE, 67% stocks (1,846 stocks) declined, while only 30% stocks (821 stocks) advanced. 72 stocks ended unchanged. All the 13 sectoral indices ended at lower levels. The BSE IT index fell 4.60%, the BSE Realty index dipped 3.73%, the BSE Teck index shed 2.97% and the BSE Bankex was down 2.52%.

Among the draggers, Reliance Infrastructure dropped 7.16% at Rs921, Infosys Technologies shed 5.92% at Rs1,645.40, ICICI Bank tumbled 4.95% at Rs652.50, DLF declined 4.56% at Rs463.40, Tata Motors was down 4.51% at Rs405, HDFC tumbled 4.24% at Rs2,170 and Sterlite Industries lost 4.23% at Rs481.50. Reliance at Rs1,922, Tata Consultancy Services at Rs805, Mahindra & Mahindra at Rs542.90, Satyam Computer Services at Rs407 and Jai Prakash Associates at Rs156.90 were down around 3% each.

Select index heavyweights managed to register decent gains. Maruti Suzuki India rose 3.61% at Rs703.70, BHEL gained 1.92% at Rs1,696.75, Hindustan Unilever scaled up 0.83% at Rs248.90, Bharti Airtel added 0.32% at Rs778.70 and NTPC jumped by 0.12% at Rs173.65.

IT stocks came under sharp hammering. NIIT slumped 5.35% at Rs79.55, Oracle lost 5.07% at Rs1,123.70, Rolta India declined 4.37% at Rs319.40 and HCL Technologies was down 3.68% at Rs228.90. Patni Computer Systems, Aptech, Mphasis, Tech Mahindra, Financial Technologies India and Wipro dipped 1-3% each.

Over 1.79 crore Reliance Natural Resources shares changed hands on the BSE followed by IFCI (1.45 crore shares), Chambal Fertilisers & Chemicals (0.55 crore shares), Austral Coke & Projects (0.55 crore shares) and Reliance Power (0.46 crore shares).