Sensex tumbles 600 pts in the early trade

Mumbai, Mar 10: Continuing the downward rally of last week, the benchmark Sensex today further slipped over 600 points to 15370 on Bombay Stock Exchange even as Nifty tumbled over 150 points in the early trade on extended lack of buying interest amid prevailing negative global cues.

Heavyweights like Larsan&Toubro and Reliance Energy plunged nearly 10 per cent creating a strong down-pull in the market that had extremely low volume. BSE Mid-caps and Small-caps were struggling nearly six per cent low from their previous close, brokers said. Sensex opened the session on negative note at 15,684.24 after its closing of 15,975.52 on Friday and further dipped into deep red, lost over four per cent in the mid-morning trade. All the sectoral indices were in negative zone. Bankex was decreased by 4.37 per cent, Power and Realty stocks were down over 6 per cent, while Consumer Durables and Capital Goods were down by eight per cent.

Last week the key indices of the Indian bourses plunged over nine per cent and further in the opening session of this week, market plunged surprisingly, following the weak global cues after US employment data heightened fears of a US recession. The worries has knocked Asian markets lower, brokers opined.

The market breadth was weak since it opened. Asian markets slipped today as Wall Street declined on Friday, March 7. Heavyweights from capital goods sector tumbled in opening trade. The private sector engineering&construction L&T plunged 11.33 per cent to Rs 2649.70 on 2.33 lakh shares on the reports that the company would be dented with the loss of nearly Rs 150 to Rs 200 crore in FY 08 due to hedging. However, the company has attributed the losses to prevailing volatility in the commodity market. It was the top loser from Sensex pack. The stock tumbled on market talks its subsidiary in gulf countries might make losses on commodity hedging.

Bharat Heavy Electricals slumped 9.81 per cent to Rs 1827, Reliance Industries declined by 2.57 per cent to Rs 2191 on 1.89 lakh shares, Reliance Energy decreased by over ten per cent, ICICI Bank down 5.91 per cent and HDFC Bank down 4.38 per cent, were under heavy selling pressure in the early trade.

As per provisional data, Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) bought shares worth Rs 513.04 crore in the previous session.

Domestic Institutional Investors (DIIs) were net sellers of shares worth Rs 66.79 crore on that day.

FIIs were net buyers of Rs 584.26 crore in the futures and options segment in the previous session. They were net sellers of index futures to the tune of Rs 109.65 crore and bought index options worth Rs 387.19 crore. They were net buyers of stock futures to the tune of Rs 300.30 crore and bought stock options worth Rs 6.42 crore.

UNI