Bloodbath on D-Street, Sensex down 1,000 points

Bloodbath on D-Street as Nifty opens below 11,400 while Sensex plunges 1,000 points in the opening session amid a global selloff.

The Indian equity markets have been hit badly due to the meltdown in global equity markets, which witnessed a high degree of selloff after coronavirus pandemic triggered fear among investors.

All the stocks on BSE Sensex are trading in deep red, with TATA Steel, Infosys, Tech Mahindra, Mahindra & Mahindra and Bajaj Finance taking the worst hit.

As Indian indices crashed by over 2.5 percent in the first five minutes of Friday's trade, the benchmark indices were dragged to the levels last seen in September 2019.

At the time of filing this copy, the 30-share benchmark index of BSE, Sensex was trading at 38,718.94, down by whopping 1,026.72 points (2.58 percent). Within the first hour of trading, markets witnessed Rs 4 lakh crore of investors' wealth being wiped off.

Also read — Dow tanks nearly 1,200 pts over virus anxiety, biggest 1-day drop since 2011

Meanwhile, S&P 500 -- that measures the stock performance of 500 large companies listed on stock exchanges in the United States -- has witnessed the biggest correction ever in history, correcting by 10 percent in the past one week.

The overall market sentiments have been heavily negative -- with 158 advances, as against 1,354 advances.

Similarly, the broader 50-share index NSE Nifty also crashed by 315.7 points (2.71%) and was trading at 11,317.6.

Globally, all the major indices are trading in deep red as coronavirus poses the threat of the global pandemic -- with some exchanges even crashing by 5 percent.

The world economy is anticipating a severe hit from coronavirus, as Hubei -- one of China’s most economically important provinces -- faces lockdown.

It is estimated that 22 million businesses or close to 90 percent of all active businesses in China are located in the most impacted regions. Additionally, as China’s share in global GDP increased four-times and rose from 4 percent in 2002 to 16 percent in 2018, the outbreak might cause a drag of approximately one percentage point on global GDP growth.