The market hit fresh intraday low in morning trade as falling rupee and surging crude prices spooked investors. At 10:18 IST, the barometer index, the S&P BSE Sensex, was down 634.57 points or 1.76% at 35,341.06. The Nifty 50 index was down 193.65 points or 1.78% at 10,664.60.
Among secondary barometers, the BSE Mid-Cap index was down 1.21%. The BSE Small-Cap index was down 1.44%. Both these indices outperformed the Sensex.
The market breadth, indicating the overall health of the market, was weak. On BSE, 572 shares rose and 1430 shares fell. A total of 86 shares were unchanged.
Reliance Industries (down 4.26%), Hero MotoCorp (down 3.23%), TCS (down 3.18%), HDFC (down 2.47%), ICICI Bank (down 2.36%) and Hindustan Unilever (down 2.27%), were the major Sensex losers.
Engineering and construction major Larsen & Toubro was up 2.21%. The company announced today that its wholly owned subsidiary, L&T Hydrocarbon Engineering (LTHE), in consortium with Baker Hughes, a GE company and McDermott International, Inc. has been awarded the subsea contract for India's Oil & Natural Gas Corporation's (ONGC) largest deepwater oil & gas project, the development of block DWN-98/2 in the Krishna Godavari basin.
Metal shares were in demand. Steel Authority of India (up 3.28%), Jindal Steel & Power (up 2.33%), Hindustan Copper (up 1.85%), National Aluminium Company (up 1.81%), NMDC (up 1.49%), Hindalco Industries (up 1.44%), Tata Steel (up 1.09%), Vedanta (up 0.77%), JSW Steel (up 0.69%) and Hindustan Zinc (up 0.14%), edged higher.
In the foreign exchange market, the rupee edged lower against the dollar. The partially convertible rupee was hovering at 73.78, compared with its close of 73.34 during the previous trading session. Rupee hit a record low of 73.795 in early deals today.
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In the global commodities markets, Brent for December 2018 settlement was down 13 cents at $86.16 a barrel. The contract had risen $1.49 a barrel or 1.76% to settle at $86.29 a barrel during the previous trading session.
Overseas, Asia markets were trading lower on Thursday following a muted performance on Wall Street overnight. China's markets are closed for the Golden Week holidays.
In US, the Dow Jones Industrial Average on Wednesday finished at a record for the 15th time this year as investors were cheered by healthy economic data. But the market pared earlier gains, with major indexes closing off intraday highs as bond yields jumped, which could dampen appetite for stocks.
Private-sector employment soared in September, as employers added 230,000 jobs, according to Automatic Data Processing Inc. Separately, the final reading on the services sector from IHS Markit fell to 53.5 in September from 54.8, while the Institute for Supply Management's reading on the non-manufacturing sector came in at 61.6.
Wall Street got an early lift after a report in Italian daily newspaper Corriere della Sera that the government may yield ground in a budget standoff with the EU, which could lessen the odds of a clash between the country and the bloc.
According to the report, Italy's budget deficit target will be set at 2.4% of GDP in 2019, but decline to 2.2% in 2020 and 2.0% in 2021. Italian officials had previously clashed with Brussels over the budget deficit target, which exceeded EU rules and stoked fears of another crisis in the region. A resolution in Italy would mean one less potential risk to watch out for.
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