Bloodbath continues on Dalal Street; Nifty breaches 16,600 mark

Indian equity benchmarks extended losses to trade with a cut of over two percentage points and Sensex and Nifty trading below their crucial 55,900 and 16,600 levels respectively, tracking across-the-board selling as concerns over rising Omicron cases spooked investors’ sentiment. India’s Omicron tally crossed 150 with Karnataka confirming five more cases on December 19. The five patients are from Dharwad, Bhadravathi, Udupi (2) and Mangaluru, Karnataka. The World Health Organization recently warned that the number of cases is doubling in 1.5 to 3 days in areas with community spread. Persistent foreign fund outflow too dented traders’ sentiment. Sentiments also remain dampened as a private report estimated 6.3 per cent real GDP expansion in FY23, among the lowest within the analyst community and stated that there is uncertainty on the growth trajectory. Also, RBI data showed declining for the third consecutive week, India’s forex reserves dipped by $77 million to reach $635.828 billion for the week ended December 10.

Regional markets too were witnessing massacre with all the Asian stocks trading in red after China slashed its benchmark lending rate for the first time in more than one-and-a-half years. The move likely indicates policymakers concerns around the slowing economic growth in China, which worried investors. Back home, selling pressure was visible across the sectors as all the sector gauges on the BSE were trading lower led by the Realty which tumbled around 4 percent followed by Metal and Basic Material. On the scrip specific front, Shares of Future Group's listed companies rallied after India's antitrust body competition commission of India (CCI) on Friday said Amazon's 2019 deal with Future will remain in abeyance, citing US e-commerce major's failure to notify certain commercial arrangements as part of 2019 deal.

The BSE Sensex is currently trading at 55814.27, down by 1197.47 points or 2.10% after trading in a range of 55651.58 and 56538.15. There were 4 stocks advancing against 26 stocks declining on the index.

The broader indices were trading in red; the BSE Mid cap index tumbled 3.00%, while Small cap index was down by 3.12%.

The top losing sectoral indices on the BSE were Realty down by 3.94%, Metal down by 3.82%, Basic Materials down by 3.29%, Bankex down by 3.27% and Industrials was down by 3.20%, while there were no gainers on the BSE sectoral front.

The top gainers on the Sensex were Wipro up by 0.54%, Power Grid up by 0.50%, Dr. Reddy's Lab up by 0.18%, TCS up by 0.05% and Sun Pharma up by 0.01%. On the flip side, Tata Steel down by 4.21%, SBI down by 3.97%, Bajaj Finance down by 3.89%, Kotak Mahindra Bank down by 3.61% and Bajaj Finserv down by 3.53% were the top losers.

Meanwhile, Union Minister for Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) Nitin Gadkari has urged investors to come forward and invest boldly in the infrastructure sector, which offers a diverse array of investment opportunities spanning multiple asset classes including highways, multimodal logistics parks, wayside amenities, ropeways, warehousing zones, and more.

He said the Internal Rate of Return in the road sector is very high and hence there is no need to worry about economic viability. He said, earlier, projects used to get stalled due to land acquisition issues. But the government decided, a project will not be awarded before 90% of land acquisition is complete and environment clearance is obtained.

Citing various other steps taken by his Ministry to speed up road infrastructure projects, he said ‘Keep your confidence 110%’ Talking about the many benefits of upcoming projects under the Bharatmala Programme he said the travel time from Mumbai to Delhi, via road, will go down from 48 hours to 12 hours within one year; road projects and multimodal infrastructure projects will reduce logistics costs and boost manufacturing, increase exports and help the economy grow.

The CNX Nifty is currently trading at 16598.10, down by 387.10 points or 2.28% after trading in a range of 16566.80 and 16840.10. There were 5 stocks advancing against 45 stocks declining on the index.

The top gainers on Nifty were Cipla up by 2.60%, Wipro up by 0.55%, Power Grid up by 0.52%, TCS up by 0.31% and Dr. Reddy's Lab up by 0.22%. On the flip side, Tata Steel down by 4.37%, SBI down by 4.02%, BPCL down by 3.98%, ONGC down by 3.95% and Hindalco down by 3.94% were the top losers.

All the Asian markets are trading in red; Nikkei 225 slipped 604.48 points or 2.12% to 27,941.20, Straits Times fell 31.93 points or 1.03% to 3,079.70, Hang Seng lost 334.13 points or 1.44% to 22,858.50, Taiwan Weighted declined 119.96 points or 0.67% to 17,692.63, KOSPI plunged 46.06 points or 1.53% to 2,971.67, Jakarta Composite dropped 38.22 points or 0.58% to 6,563.71 and Shanghai Composite was down by 27.15 points or 0.75% to 3,605.21.