Sensex falls 656 points, Nifty ends below 17,950; IT stocks top losers

The Indian market ended lower for the second consecutive session today amid negative global cues. Sensex closed 656 points lower at 60,098 and Nifty fell 174 points to 17,938. Infosys, Asian Paints, HUL, Nestle India and Bajaj Finance were the top Sensex losers, falling up to 2.77%.

SBI, Tata Steel and Maruti Suzuki were the top Sensex gainers, rising up to 1.83% . BSE mid cap and small cap indices fell 87 points and rose 8 points, respectively.

 Of 30 Sensex stocks, 22 ended lower. Market cap of BSE-listed firms fell to Rs 274.77 lakh crore.  

Market breadth was negative with 1,579 stocks ending higher against 1,827 stocks closing lower on BSE. 89 shares were unchanged. Auto and metal shares were the top sectoral gainers with BSE auto rising 168 points and BSE metal index gaining 177 points, respectively.

IT and banking shares were the top sectoral losers falling 737 points and 226 points, respectively.

Shrikant Chouhan, Head of Equity Research (Retail), Kotak Securities Ltd said, "Overseas factors continued to weigh on domestic stocks as weak global markets coupled with concerns that a rate hike by the US Fed could be on the cards sooner-than-expected triggered wide-spread selling for the second straight session. The Nifty breaking the important level of 18000 and closing below the same is expected to be largely negative for the market. The index is likely to consolidate within the range of 17820 to 18050. For the bulls, 17960 would be the key level to watch for, and above the same the index could rally up to 18000-18050 levels. On the flip side, dismissal of 17900 would trigger one more leg of correction up to 17850-17820 levels."

Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) sold shares worth Rs 1,254 crore on January 18, and domestic institutional investors (DIIs) offloaded shares worth Rs 220 crore, as per provisional data available on NSE.

On Tuesday, Sensex closed 554 points lower at 60,754 and Nifty fell 195 points to 18,113. Maruti, UltraTech Cement, Tech Mahindra and HCL Tech were the top Sensex losers, falling up to 4.05%. Axis Bank, HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank, and Kotak Bank were the top Sensex gainers, rising up to 1.83%.

 Global markets

France's CAC 40 added 0.1% to 7,138.95, while Germany's DAX shed 0.3% to 15,720.91. Britain's FTSE 100 sank 0.1% to 7,556.70. The futures for the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the S&P 500 were 0.1% lower. Japan's benchmark Nikkei 225 dropped 2.8% to finish at 27,467.23, its lowest close since August.

In other Asian trading, Australia's S&P/ASX 200 fell 1.0% to 7,332.50. South Korea's Kospi dropped 0.8% to 2,842.28. Hong Kong's Hang Seng inched up 0.1% to 24,127.85, while the Shanghai Composite lost 0.3% to 3,558.18.