Equity benchmark indices remained under selling pressure on Thursday and tumbled over 1 per cent amid mixed corporate earnings, weakness in global markets and the US Federal Reserve’s comments a day earlier.
Global indices fell after the US Fed Reserve lowered interest rates by 25 basis points for the first time in a decade but also signalled it may not need to do more.
When the closing bell rang, the BSE S & P Sensex was down 462 points or 1.23% at 37,018 while the Nifty 50 edged 105 points lower to 10,980.
At the National Stock Exchange, all sectoral indices except auto were in the red with Nifty metal down by 3.13%, media by 3.12% and PSU bank by 2.6%.
Among stocks, Coffee Day Enterprises plunged another 10 per cent for the third day in a row and traded at Rs 110.95 per share, a day after Cafe Coffee Day founder V G Siddhartha’s body was found near the Netravathi river in Mangaluru.
Vedanta dipped by 5.6%, JSW Steel by over 5%, Hindalco by 4.2% and Tata Steel by 2.8%.
State Bank of India closed 4.7% lower which Tata Motors was down 4.4 per cent, Bharti Airtel by 3.7 per cent and Infosys by 2.9 per cent.
Zee Entertainment was down by 4% at Rs 346.00 per share after the parent company Essel Group led by Subhash Chandra said it had offloaded 11 per cent of the nearly 36% promoter stake in Zee Entertainment Enterprises to existing investor Invesco Oppenheimer for Rs 4,224 crore.
However, Maruti and Wipro gained 2.1% each. Bharti Infratel, Power Grid and Reliance Industries too showed gains between 1.6 and 1.9%.
Meanwhile, Asian shares fell to six-week lows as the US Federal Reserve Meanwhile, Asian shares fell to six-week lows as the US Federal Reserve signalled there will not be a long chain of cuts.
MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan faltered 0.6%. Japan’s Nikkei reversed early losses and were slightly higher. Losses in Chinese shares accelerated after opening lower with the blue-chip index down 0.8%.