FIIs selling scare investors with over 200 points fall on Sensex

Mumbai, Mar 8 (UNI) The Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) 30-share sensitive index (Sensex) fell sharply by 216 points to 10,508.85 today following the outflow of foreign fund in future&options trading.

Earlier, the Sensex fell 243 points in intra-day trading to 10,497 on the back of huge selling by the foreign institutional investors (FIIS) yesterday in the future and options (F&O) contracts.

Yesterday, too, the Sensex had closed flat at 10,725 with a loss of nine points.

In the morning, the Sensex opened flat at 10,728 as compared to the last close of 10,725 points, but then started sliding as the FIIs figures were reported.

It has been trading at the highest levels and a correction was expected from several quarters.

Leading foreign investment firm JM Morgan Stanley today said that Indian equity market was heavily dependent on liquidity coming from abroad, which made it highly vulnerable.

The National Stock Exchange (NSE) 50-share S&P CNX Nifty index also fell by 2.08 per cent or 66.10 points, settling at 3,116.70 as compared to the last close of 3,182.80.

However, the combined turnover in the Indian equity markets which touhced at Rs 60,469.44 crore was highest ever and at Rs 44,097.66 crore, the turnover was highest for the Future&Options trading as well.

All the BSE sectoral indices ended in the red led by the Metal index which showed a fall by 4.32 per cent, followed by the Consumer Durable index which fell by 2.62 per cent and the Automobile index fell by 1.84 per cent.

Others to fall heavily were Public Sector Undertaking index by 1.92 per cent and Oil&Gas index by 1.65 per cent.

Losses were minimum in the Capoital Goods, Health Care and Infotech sectoral indices.

The BSE Midcap stocks index was down too by 1.33 per cent and BSE Smallcap index was down by 1.05 per cent.

There were just four blue chips ending with gains on the Sensex led by Cipla, others were BHEL, Reliance Energy and Hero Honda.

Top ten Sensex losers were Tata Steel,Hindalco, HLL, HDFC, Maruti, Tata Motors,Wipro, Bharti Televentures, ITC and NTPC.

The global crude oil prices softened further to USD 61.48 per barrel at the the New York Mercantile Exchange (NYMEX) but couldn't restrict the losses in the equity markets.

The Metal sector, which came in for heavy correction, saw a huge fall in Tata Steel and Hindalco. Tata Steel closed with a loss of 5.11 per cent at Rs 443.80 and aluminium major Hindalco lost 4.78 per cent at Rs 159.20. Another aluminium major NALCO lost 3.79 per cent at Rs 277.95. Among the other steel companies losing were Steel Authority of India(SAIL) by 4.50 per cent at Rs 64.80; Jindal Steel lost by 1.46 per cent to Rs 1,763.05; Essar Steel lost 5.53 per cent to Rs 40.15.

Sakuma Exports Ltd made its debut on the stock markets today, opening at Rs 60 per share against the issue price of Rs 50 for Rs 10 share on the NSE. However, with the negative sentiments in the markets the scrip closed 5.90 per cent lower at Rs 47.05 after touching an intra-day low of Rs 42.10. A total of 5.15 milion shares were traded on the NSE.

The other major Sensex losers were Hindustan Lever, falling by 4.02 per cent to Rs 242.20; HDFC by 3.77 per cent to Rs 1,293.10; Maruti by 3.72 per cent to Rs 882.90; Tata Motors by 3.49 per cent to Rs 879.65; Wipro by 2.83 per cent to Rs 507.80; Bharti by 2.67 per cent to Rs 391.85; ITC by 2.56 per cent to Rs 173.40 and NTPC by 2.54 per cent to Rs 134.20.

The gainers on Sensex were led by Cipla, which ended at Rs 574.95, up by 0.78 per cent; BHEL closed at Rs 2,146.95, up by 0.49 per cent; Reliance Energy closed 0.44 per cent higher at Rs 654 and Hero Honda closed 0.17 per cent up at Rs 888.55.

The market breadth was highly negative with across the board selling. Out of 2,609 scrips traded on the BSE, 1,634 scrips ended lower and 898 scrips ended with gain.

With FIIs buying equity worth USD 50.2 million on Tuesday as reported by market regulator SEBI, the markets may recover a part of the losses tomorrow.

Moreover, with huge liquidity waiting on the sidelines with the mutual funds in particular, the Sensex is expected to trade above 10,000 levels.

UNI