NEW DELHI: Equity indices Sensex and Nifty took big blows on Monday on the eve of Assembly poll outcome on the assessment that the road for the ruling BJP in 2019 will be bumpy.
The results of elections of five Indian states are due on Tuesday. Exit poll results have already painted a picture of tough numbers for the BJP.
A selloff in global stocks on growth worries and a flare-up of tension between the US and China made investors jittery.
An upswing in crude oil prices after Opec and its allies agreed to cut production dragged the rupee lower, making the situation even worse.
The Sensex crashed 714 points, or 2 per cent, to end at 34,959.72, with only Coal India (0.76 per cent) and Maruti Suzuki (0.49 per cent) holding up.
The NSE benchmark Nifty plunged 205 points, or 1.92 per cent, to close the day at 10,488.45, with five stocks – Indian Oil Corporation, BPCL, Coal India, HPCL and Maruti – going up. A total of 44 slid as Eicher Motors settled unchanged.
BSE Midcap and Smallcap indices closed 1.84 per cent down each, whereas the volatility index, India VIX, jumped 10.85 per cent.
Let's take a look at highlights of Monday's session.
Rs 2.50 lakh crore knocked off!
Over Rs 2.50 lakh crore worth of wealth was gone on Monday's selloff as the cumulative market capitalisation of BSE listed firms plunged to Rs 1,37,92,970.08 crore from Rs 1,40,43,253.64 crore on Friday.
Top drags on Sensex
Reliance Industries accounted for much of the Sensex weakness, followed by Kotak Mahindra Bank, HDFC, Infosys and Larsen & Toubro. In terms of percentage losses, Kotak Mahindra Bank (down 6.56 per cent) led the band, followed by Reliance Industries (3.95 per cent), Asian Paints (down 3.48 per cent), Tata Motors (down 3.45 per cent) and Adani Ports (down 3.41 per cent).
Nifty falls below the signal line
The Nifty came off around 2 per cent, with daily MACD making a negative crossover on charts.
Top BSE losers
Infibeam Avenues (down 10.14 per cent), NLC India (down 7.43 per cent), Magma Fincorp (down 7.37 per cent), Jubilant Life Sciences (down 7.13 per cent) and Jet Airways (India) (down 6.77 per cent) emerged as the top five losers on the BSE. Meanwhile, Texmaco Rail & Engineering (up 5.58 per cent), HFCL (up 4.84 per cent), Ashoka Buildcon (up 4.45 per cent), D B Corp (up 3.73 per cent) and Kaveri Seed Company (up 3.61) defied market sentiment and finished the day as top gainers on the BSE.
320 stocks at 52-week lows
As many as 320 stocks, including IL&FS Transportation Networks, Cipla, Ashok Leyland, Bharat Forge, JK Tyre, NBCC, ONGC, SAIL and Jindal Steel & Power, hit 52-week lows on the BSE today. However, Muthoot Finance and Linde India featured among the 30 stocks that touched their 52-week highs.
228 stocks hit lower circuit
Vakrangee, Shankara Building Products, Kwality and IL&FS Transportation Networks featured among the 228 stocks that touched their lower circuits on BSE, compared with 125 stocks, including Cravatex, Sika Interplant Systems, Sportking India and Creative Castings, which hit their upper circuits.
Realty pack top sectoral loser
The realty pack, with a loss of 3.15 per cent, settled as the top loser among sectoral indices on the BSE. Each sectoral index suffered losses today, with telecom, energy, finance, industrials, bank and capital goods falling over 2 per cent. BSE Oil & Gas incurred a minimum loss of 0.74 per cent.
Stocks below their 200-DMA
V-Guard Industries, Oriental Bank of Commerce, United Spirits, Lupin, PTC India, Hindustan Motors, Power Finance Corporation, Adani Ports and Kotak Mahindra Bank featured among stocks that traded below their 200-DMAs today.
Oversold & overbought stocks
Sun Pharma, Arvind, Punj Lloyd, Jindal Stainless, IL&FS Transportation and Quess Corp appeared among the 63 stocks that settled in the oversold zone on the BSE, according to momentum oscillator Relative Strength Index, or RSI. On the other hand, the RSI showed 28 stocks, including Orient Tradelink, GBL Industries, Maestros Electronics, A Infrastructure and Advance Lifestyles in the overbought zone on the BSE.
163 stocks show potential slide
Momentum indicator moving average convergence divergence, or MACD, showed bearish crossovers on 163 counters on the BSE. Among the stocks that saw bullish crossovers were Vedanta, Vedanta, Biocon, Bajaj Finance, Power Grid Corporation, Exide Industries and BHEL. On the other hand, 39 counters, including MOIL, Goldstone Tech, Next Mediaworks, Prajay Engineers and Indo Thai Securities displayed bullish crossovers.
Nifty outlook
"The daily chart showed that the Inside bar pattern that was formed on Friday broke out on the downside today. Nifty has started forming lower top lower bottom on the daily chart, which confirms the downtrend. The weekly chart shows that the index is tumbling down as a follow through of a Dark cloud cover formation in the last week. All these observations suggest that the bears are having an upper hand on the index. In terms of the Fibonacci retracement, the Nifty has so far retraced 50 per cent of the November bounce. Subsequent level on the downside will be the 61.8 per cent retracement mark i.e. 10,362. The larger picture shows that the Nifty is poised to test the recent low of 10,005," said Gaurav Ratnaparkhi, senior technical analyst of Sharekhan by BNP Paribas.
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