Sensex drops 196pts, IOC gains 5%

The Sensex opened with a negative gap of 31 points at 8,693, which turned out to be the high for the day. Sustained, across-the-board selling saw the index crash to a low of 8,508 - down 216 points from the previous close. The Sensex finally closed with a loss of 196 points (2.24%) at 8,529.

All the sectoral indices also declined today. The BSE Metal Index tanked nearly 4% (273 points) to 6,649. The BSE Bankex slipped over 3% (165 points) to 4,878. The BSE FMCG Index was down 2.5% (38 points) at 1,478. The BSE Auto Index was down over 2% (89 points) at 3,704.

The mood continued to be bearish - out of 2,543 scrips traded, 1,933 declined, 578 advanced and 32 were unchanged today.

ONGC dropped 3% (Rs 33) to Rs 1,039. Reliance declined 1.4% (Rs 11) to Rs 791. SBI slipped  2.3% (Rs 22) to Rs 925.

While HLL declined Rs 6 to Rs 175, ITC was down Rs 4 at Rs 128.

Infosys lost Rs 27 to Rs 2,616. While TCS declined Rs 44 to Rs 1,426, Wipro was down 3.6% (Rs 15) to Rs 390.

Bajaj dropped 3.2% (Rs 58) to Rs 1,724. BHEL dipped 2.8% (Rs 35) to Rs 1,225. Tata Steel was down 5% (Rs 21) at Rs 404.

ICICI Bank declined 4.5% (Rs 25) to Rs 536. HDFC was down Rs 29 at Rs 1,002, and HDFC Bank dropped Rs 24 to Rs 684.

Dr. Reddy's bucked the trend, and moved up Rs 14 to Rs 923. Ranbaxy was up Rs 6 at 519.

Oil scrips logged gains today. IOC advanced nearly 5% (Rs 21) to Rs 472. BPCL moved up 3% (Rs 13) to Rs 425. IBP was up 2.6% at Rs 510. Kochi Refineries and HPCL gained 2% each to Rs 178 and Rs 328, respectively.

Reliance was the most active counter with a turnover of Rs 233 crore followed by HDFC (Rs 151 crore), Satyam (Rs 135 crore), Tata Steel (Rs 117 crore) and Infosys (Rs 115 crore).