The benchmark Sensex on Monday dropped by 94 points after slipping below the 9,000-level on alternate bouts of buying and selling, showing that the G-20 Summit has failed to bolster investor sentiment here.
In the see-saw trade, the 30-share index closed at 9,291.01, a loss of 94.41 points or 1.01 per cent.
The National Stock Exchange index, Nifty, also fell by 10.80 points or 0.38 per cent to close at 2,799.55.
The Sensex had slipped below the 8,000-level to 7,697 points on October 27.
After a weak opening, the Sensex traded below the 9,000-level before mid-session. With selling pressure intensifying, the bellwether index lost nearly 428 points to touch the intra-day low of 8,956.68 points.
However, it regained the 9,000-level on late buying by domestic funds. Erratic movements in European markets during their early trade also influenced local stocks in late afternoon trade, brokers said.
They said the Reserve Bank of India’s (RBI’s) fresh measures on Saturday to enhance rupee and forex liquidity, besides reducing risk weights for corporate and commercial real estate loans to boost growth, failed to have any desired impact on the market.
Brokers said selling pressure intensified with investors forseeing a deteriorating economic outlook as Japan joined the list of economies in recession. They said investors were also worried because the leaders of G-20 nations failed to produce concrete measures to tackle the global crisis.
At the G-20 Summit on Financial Market and World Economy, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh warned that the financial meltdown had exploded into a systemic crisis, while world leaders called for a strong regulatory mechanism to bring transparency into the financial system and stimulate growth to beat recession.
Marketmen said trading sentiment was dampened following rating agency JPMorgan cutting its forecast for India’s economic growth.
The realty sector index suffered the most by losing 5.17 per cent at 1,907.51 with all the 14 components, led by Sobha Developers and DLF, ending in the negative zone. The banking sector index was the second-worst performer by losing 3.87 per cent at 4,956.04. Banking stocks such as ICICI Bank and HDFC Bank led the fall as investors fretted a weakening economy would raise defaults.
The metal index dropped by 3.08 per cent to 4,723.10 on fears that deepening economic crisis might reduce demand for metals, mostly used by construction and power sectors. Besides, the weak trend in overseas metal markets further fuelled the selling pressure here. The consumer durable index fell by 3.26 per cent to 1,877.08, FMCG index by 1.90 per cent to 1,870.50 and auto index dipped by 1.39 per cent to 2,405.71.
