Gains in banking shares helped the indices recover from early lows but selling in IT, energy and pharma shares restricted the gains.
Gains in banking shares helped the indices recover from early lows but selling in IT, energy and pharma shares restricted the gains.
Benchmark Sensex declined 224 points on Wednesday, snapping its four-session winning streak, mainly due to sell-off in IT and pharma counters amid rising concerns over possible aggressive interest rate hikes to tame high inflation.
The 30-share index rebounded more than 1,200 points from the early lows before settling at 60,346.97 points, a total loss of 224.11 points or 0.37% compared to Tuesday’s closing level.
The broader NSE Nifty closed lower 66.30 points or 0.37% at 18,003.75 points.
With the higher than expected inflation reported in the U.S. in August, there are now concerns that the U.S. Federal Reserve is likely to go for aggressive rate hikes, pushing global markets into the red.
The Sensex had plunged 1,150 points to a low of 59,417.12 points while the Nifty declined to a low of 17,771.15 points in early trade on Wednesday following deep losses in U.S. markets.
Gains in banking shares helped the indices recover from early lows but selling in IT, energy and pharma shares restricted the gains.
Infosys fell the most by 4.53% among the Sensex scrips. TCS, Tech Mahindra, HCL Tech, L&T, Wipro, and Reliance were among the major losers.
IndusInd, PowerGrid, NTPC, SBI, Kotak Bank and HDFC twins advanced.
On the domestic front, the wholesale price-based inflation eased for the third consecutive month in August to 12.41% on softening in prices of manufactured items. However, August was the 17th consecutive month of double-digit wholesale price inflation.
Global stock markets also declined following overnight losses at Wall Street as higher-than-expected inflation fanned rate hike fears. European benchmarks were marginally lower while Asian markets witnessed steeper losses.
The U.S. inflation slowed only to 8.3% in August, instead of the 8.1% economists expected.
Germany’s DAX lost 0.2% and France’s CAC 40 gave up 0.3% while the UK’s FTSE 10 shed 0.7%t.
Tokyo’s benchmark Nikkei 225 lost 2.8%, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index fell 2.3%, and the Shanghai Composite index declined 0.8%.
Foreign institutional investors pumped in ₹1,956.98 crore into domestic equities on Tuesday, as per data available with BSE.
