Sensex falls 350 points, Nifty below 5100
The Fertiliser Ministry has supported the comments made by industry body Fertiliser Association of India (FAI) on the implications of cutting supply of cheap natural gas to P&K units.
India's benchmark indices traded with nearly 2 per cent losses as markets entered the last hour of trade Monday. The Sensex was down 330 points to 16,904 while the Nifty declined 103 points to 5,101 at 1500 hours.
Capital goods sector led the declines, falling nearly 4.5% on the Bombay Stock Exchange. BHEL (down 9.3%), one of the biggest PSU companies that deals in heavy equipment, continued to be under selling pressure. The stock traded at 248, nearing its life time low of 225.
On Friday, BHEL reported a fall in order inflows in the third quarter, a first in almost 10-years. BHEL is unlikely to meet its full year order guidance of Rs 55,000 crore.
Another index heavy weight L&T was down 4%. Among other stocks in the cap goods space, BGR Energy, Crompton Greaves and Suzlon Energy - all traded with 6-7 per cent losses.
Among other groups of stocks, banks, metals, power, realty and consumer durables traded 2-3 per cent lower.
Analysts attributed the selloff to profit booking. India's benchmark indices have jumped nearly 10 per cent in the first few days of this year on account of steady inflow of foreign capital.
"We have witnessed close to 800 points rally in less than 1 months’ time... So, it is obvious that the markets should correct. Fundamentally, things haven't changed much. Only the fear factor has gone away to a great extent... A correction of 150 points is possible and 5,100-5,150 are good levels to enter the markets again," Deven Choksey, MD at KR Choksey Securities told NDTV Profit.
Private sector lender ICICI Bank was the biggest drag on the Sensex, contributing over 50 points on the downside. Reliance Industries also cost nearly 48 index points to the Sensex.
