Sensex tumbles over 340 pts; Nifty dips below 8,900-mark

The benchmark BSE Sensex plunged over 340 points to 29,108.26 and the NSE Nifty dipped below the 8,900-mark in early trade today on heavy selling by funds and investors amid weak Asian cues.

The 30-share barometer plunged by 340.69 points, or 1.16 per cent, to 29,108.26 with all sectoral indices, led by IT, tech, banking and power, trading in negative zone with losses up to 2.09 per cent.

The index had gained 68.22 points in the previous session on Thursday.

Markets remained closed on Friday on account of 'Holi'.

On similar lines, the National Stock Exchange index Nifty slipped below the 8,900-mark by dropping 110.45 points, or 1.24 per cent, to 8,827.30.

Brokers said heavy selling by participants in recent out-performers, following a weak trend at other Asian markets after a strong US jobs report raised expectations that the Federal Reserve will hike interest rates soon, dampening trading sentiments here.

Prominent losers among the 30 Sensex stocks were TCS, Axis Bank, Bharti Airtel, BHEL, GAIL, HDFC, HDFC Bank, Hero MotoCorp, Infosys, M&M, Maruti Suzuki, NTPC, ONGC, SBI, Sesa Sterlite, Sun Pharma and Tata Motors.

Among other Asian markets, Hong Kong's Hang Seng was down by 0.75 per cent, while Japan's Nikkei fell 0.63 per cent in early trade today after data showed that Japanese economy grew slower than expected in the last quarter of 2014.

The US Dow Jones Industrial Average ended 1.54 per cent lower in Friday's trade.