Domestic markets snapped the streak of weekly losses even as sombre global mood butchered bulls at the bourses for two days straight. A rise in Brent crude prices along with a jump in bond yields acted as the double whammy on stocks on Friday, pushing benchmark equity indices down by nearly one per cent. However, a tilt towards defensives towards the fag-end of the session lifted markets off-lows.
Among headline indices, the S&P BSE Sensex ended at 50,405 levels today, erasing 441 points or 0.87 per cent. From the day's high of 50,886, the index tumbled 726 points to hit a low of 50,160. Financial, pharma, and IT counters were the top drags on the index today with IndusInd Bank, State Bank of India, ICICI Bank, HCL Tech, Bajaj Finserv, Infosys, Dr Reddy's Labs, Sun Pharma, and HDFC leading the list of losers. All these stocks were down in the range of 1.7 per cent to 5 per cent.
On the upside, ONGC, Maruti Suzuki, Nestle India, Titan, Reliance Industries, and L&T supported the markets with up to 2.5 per cent gains.
On the NSE, the Nifty50 settled above the 14,900-mark at 14,938, down 143 points or 0.95 per cent. 38 of the 50 stocks declined on the Nifty today, while 12 advanced.
For the week, the benchmark Sensex and Nifty indices are up about 2.6 per cent each.
All the sectoral indices were painted red amid across-the-board sell-off. The Nifty PSU index plunged 4 per cent on the NSE, followed by the Nifty Metal index (down 3 per cent), and the Nifty IT and Realty indices (down 2 per cent each). The Nifty Bank, Auto, FMCG, and Financial Services indices slipped between 0.5 per cent and 1.7 per cent.
In the broader markets, the S&P BSE MidCap and SmallCap indices dropped 1.9 per cent and 1.5 per cent, respectively.
The overall market breadth favoured bears with 1,904 stocks ending the day in the red, compared with around 1,083 stocks that advanced on the BSE.
Amid this, some stocks managed to outrun the markets today.
>> First of these is UltraTech Cement that joined the elite club of companies with Rs 2-trillion market capitalisation on the BSE after the company's stock price rose 2.5 per cent and hit a new high of Rs 6,946 in intra-day trade. However, by close, the m-cap stood at Rs 1.96 trillion.
>> That apart, shares of Heranba Industries made a strong debut on the bourses on Friday with the stock listing at Rs 900, a 43.5 per cent premium over its issue price of Rs 627 per share on the BSE. The stock extended its gains and traded as high as Rs 944.95 in intra-day deals. However, the stock pared its gains marginally and closed at Rs 812 apiece on the BSE, a 29.5 per cent premium against the issue price.
>> On the flipside, shares of Laurus Labs plunged 5 per cent to Rs 349 on the BSE in the intra-day trade on Friday after the promoters of the firm sold 1.3 per cent stake in the company for Rs 258 crore via the open market to release pledged shares. The stock ended 4.6 per cent lower at Rs 351 on the BSE today.
Meanwhile in the primary market, MTAR Tech's issue surprised D Street with its stellar subscription. The issue which was oversubscribed by just 10 time till Thursday, got an oversubscription of 201 times till 4:30 PM on the last day of the issue. Non-institutional investors' portion was subscribed nearly 400 times while retail portion was subscribed by 25 times.
Global markets
Australian stocks dropped more than 0.7 per cent, Japan's Nikkei share average shed 0.2 per cent, and shares in South Korea fell 0.4 per cent.
Chinese shares, which had opened in the red, reversed losses with the blue-chip CSI300 index up 0.3 per cent. That left MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside of Japan down 0.4 per cent.
In Europe, the pan-European STOXX 600 fell 0.7 per cent.
In the commodities market, however, oil prices jumped more than $1 a barrel on Friday, hitting their highest levels in nearly 14 months, after OPEC and its allies agreed not to increase supply in April.
Brent crude futures for May rose to as high as $68 a barrel on Friday, a level not seen since Jan. 8, 2020. The contract was on track for a near 3 per cent gain in the week.
 "Market Wrap, March 5: Here's all that happened in the markets today")
