Sensex, Nifty end lower on fag-end sell-off; banking, IT shares top losers

Benchmark indices ended lower on Thursday as a fag-end sell-off erased early gains, with IT and banking stocks falling amid monthly derivatives expiry. After remaining in the positive territory for most part of the trade, Sensex suddenly came under selling pressure during the last half-hour of the session. It closed 310.71 points lower at 58,774.72. During the day, it hit a high of 59,484.35 and a low of 58,666.41.

Nifty dropped 82.50 points or 0.47 per cent to end at 17,522.45.

Bajaj Finance, IndusInd Bank, Infosys, Tata Consultancy Services, Axis Bank, Power Grid, NTPC, Larsen & Toubro and HDFC were the top Sensex losers, falling up to 1.81 per cent.

Maruti Suzuki India, State Bank of India, Dr Reddy’s and Titan were the top gainers, rising up to 0.46 per cent. Of 30 Sensex stocks, 25 ended in the red.

Share Market update: Sensex falls 310 pts, Nifty below 17,550; Bajaj Finance, Infy decline

Nagaraj Shetti, Technical Research Analyst, HDFC Securities said, “After showing a sustainable upmove in the last couple of sessions, Nifty slipped into sharp intraday weakness on Thursday amidst high volatility and closed the day lower by 82 points. After opening with a positive note, the market showed upmove with volatility in the mid part of the session. Sharp intraday weakness got triggered from the highs in the later part and the market finally closed near the lows.”

Banking and IT shares were the top sectoral losers with their BSE indices falling 120 points and 258 points, respectively.

Market breadth was positive with 1,905 stocks ending higher against 517 stocks falling on BSE. 130 shares were unchanged.

Market cap of BSE-listed firms fell to Rs 275.84 lakh crore today.

Foreign institutional investors remained net buyers on Thursday as they bought shares worth Rs 23.19 crore, as per exchange data.

Shrikant Chouhan, Head of Equity Research (Retail), Kotak Securities said, “Amid heightened volatility, investors pruned their long positions on the F&O expiry day due to the uncertain global economic scenario. There are concerns that the Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell’s speech at the Jackson Hole symposium on Friday would focus on more rate hikes to rein in inflation. Also, benchmark indices had come close to slipping into negative zones in the last two sessions, and hence correction was on expected lines.”

Previous session

The Indian market managed to close in the green in a highly volatile session on Wednesday. Sensex rose 54 points to 59,085 and Nifty ended 30 pts higher at 17,607. Of 30 Sensex stocks, 15 ended in the green today. IndusInd Bank, NTPC, L&T, ICICI Bank and PowerGrid were the top Sensex gainers, rising up to 2.86 per cent. Tata Steel, TCS, Titan and Sun Pharma were the top Sensex losers, falling up to 0.93 per cent.