Nifty ends below 3600; Realty, Cap Goods, Power dip 2-5 per cent

11 May 2009

The benchmark indices closed sharply lower on the first day of the week, ahead of Election results on Saturday. Negative global cues also weighed on the markets. Both the indices were volatile in the first couple of hours of the trade. The sell-off was seen in shares of infrastructure, telecom, metal, FMCG, cement, realty, technology and oil & gas exploration companies. The broader indices too slipped and kept the market breadth in favour of declines.

The 30-share BSE Sensex closed below the 12,000 mark, fell 193.44 points or 1.63%, to 11,682.99. The 50-share NSE Nifty touched an intraday low of 3534.55, before ending the day at 3554.60, down 1.83% or 66.10 points. Among the broader indices - the BSE Midcap Index slipped 1.56% or 59 points, to 3,711.42 and the Smallcap Index lost 2.15% or 91.94 points, to settle at 4,185.32.

Ajay Loganadan, HSBC Private Banking said, "While leading upto the elections we are going to see probably plenty of volatility and nervousness and that's what we are witnessing today, some amount of pullback. We can't forget that our markets have rallied from the bottom with almost a 50% jump from 8,100-8,200 levels, so we are witnessing a lot of profit booking now."

He also said, "Post results it's really going to depend on what we get as far as results go. As far as what the market has been factoring in is a Congress or BJP led collation. If we get any surprises from that front, we could see the market react pretty negatively. But otherwise people will or atleast traders would start to lighten up positions ahead of election results given this week that we are in and post results it is very difficult to tell."

Among the frontliners, Unitech tumbled 9%. DLF, SBI, Reliance Communication, Jaiprakash Associates, Tata Motors, Tata Steel, Ranbaxy Labs, HUL, L&T, Bharti Airtel, Grasim, BHEL, TCS and Hindalco declined 2-5%.

On the sectoral front, the BSE Realty Index slid 5.2%. Capital Goods, Power, Metal, Oil & Gas, FMCG, Healthcare and IT indices fell 1-2.5%.