Stock market volatility hits a historic low in 2017

Benchmark Nifty has posted declines of over 1% only on six occasions this year

Investors went into a tizzy when the benchmark indices fell less than two per cent on Friday, and after the stocks extended the fall by another one per cent on Monday. Corrections of this magnitude are considered “business as usual”, but not this year.

So far in 2017, the benchmark Nifty, a gauge tracking the movement of the country’s top 50 stocks, has fallen one per cent or more only on six occasions. The trend is not restricted to just India; the Dow Jones index, a gauge of the top 30 US stocks, has posted over one per cent