Bucking the positive trend in Asian markets, the Bombay Stock Exchange benchmark Sensex On Wednesday fell by over 260 points on heavy selling in the last two hours of trading with Satyam Computer tanking more than 30 per cent.
Marketmen said though Satyam called off the deal to buy out two infrastructure companies promoted by the sons of its chief Ramalinga Raju, it had raised serious questions of corporate governance and institutional resisted the decision, which impacted the sentiment adversely.
After moving in an erratic fashion till mid-session, the bellwether index nosedived, taking weak cues from European bourses which opened lower despite a record rate cut the US Fed Reserve yesterday. However, the Asian bourses closed the day higher in the range of 1-2 per cent.
The 30-share Sensex on BSE finally closed the lower by 261.69 points at 9715.29. Similarly, the wide-based National Stock Exchange index Nifty dropped by 87.40 points at 2954.35.
Satyam was hammered and the IT major ended the lower by a mammoth 30.22 per cent. Soon after the company announced the deal, its shares had fallen 55 per cent on NYSE yesterday.
The other big losers included RCom which lost 13.36 per cent after reports of the government seeking a special audit of the company by the Comptroller and Auditor General. Reliance Infrastructure was the second biggest loser at 13.73 per cent. Besides Jaipraksh Associates (12.11 per cent), cement major ACC was the prominent loser at 9.21 per cent.