Sensex, Nifty fall to 6-week lows; ONGC, RIL slip on crude drop

After a day’s breather, Indian stocks continued their downslide on Thursday with benchmark Sensex tumbling 229.09 points to six-week low of 27,602.01 on sharp losses in RIL and ONGC after further drop in crude oil price.

Similarly, the 50-issue CNX Nifty of the NSE also plunged by 62.75 points, or 0.75 per cent, to end below 8,300-mark for the first time after one and half months at 8,292.90.

In line fall in local equities, the Indian rupee fell to nine-month low levels of 62.3 against the greenback.

Weak Asian trends on the back of overnight steep fall on Wall Street amid slow down in capital inflows weighed on the stock market sentiment here.

Besides Oil&Gas, realty, IT, power and banking counters also suffered heavy losses while only some of the defensive pharma stocks attracted some buying interest.

Besides RIL and ONGC, Infosys, ICICI Bank, HDFC, Tata Motors, Bharti Airtel, TCS, Tata Steel, Hero MotoCorp, Tata Power and Gail India suffered marked losses. Brent crude oil fell to five-year low below $65 a barrel, putting pressure on oil companies.

The BSE 30-share barometer resumed lower on weak Asian cues and moved in negative terrain throughout the day before concluding at 27,602.01, a fall of 229.09 points or 0.82 per cent. This is its weakest close since 27,346.33 on October 30.

On Wednesday, Sensex had snapped a three-day falling trend as it recovered by about 34.09 points or 0.12 per cent.

“Weak Asian markets and fresh fears from Euro region kept Indian markets volatile. Mixed sentiments on the back of weak rupee and lower oil too added to the volatility. FII liquidity outflow on the back of profit booking too added to weakness,” said Hiren Dhakan, Associate Fund Manager, Bonanza Portfolio.