Tuesday, 15 July 2008 STOCKS Markets Crash, Sensex Ends At 15-month Low The stock market nosedived on Tuesday with its benchmark Sensex losing over 654 points to a 15-month low, as forecast of increasing risk to rupee-denominated investments added to the woes of investors already battling with domestic political uncertainty and weak global cues. Bank stocks were among the biggest hit on fears that the financial services majors in the US and Europe were in for further losses from the sub-prime crisis, even as all the 30 Sensex blue-chip stocks dipped into the red on heavy selling. The Bombay Stock Exchange's Sensex settled at 12,676.19 points, down 654.32 points from its previous close, while the National Stock Exchange's Nifty plunged 178.60 points, or 4.42 per cent, to close the day at 3,861.10 points. Both the key indices lost close to five per cent each. Across the market, there was just one gainer for almost five stocks recording losses during the day. Besides banking majors such as ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank, SBI, HDFC, a number of other blue-chips such as Ranbaxy, RCOM and Hindalco sufferred huge losses. While Ranbaxy dropped for the second day in a row on concerns about the charges levelled against the company by the US drug regulators, RCOM also moved down on continuing uncertainty about a potential amalgamation deal with South African telecom major MTN. Among the sectoral indices, bankex, which closed lower by 7.75 per cent, was the worst performer, followed by realty index at 5.44 per cent, consumer goods at 5.25 per cent, metal 5.11 per cent and power 4.91 per cent. Marketmens said foreign funds continued their selling spree, prompting operators as well as retail investors to follow the suit. Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) continued their selling, adding fuel to the fire. They pulled out over Rs 436 crore from cash segment on July 14 as per provisional data while sold shares worth Rs 605.98 crore in the futures and options segment on the same day. Ranbaxy Laboratories, India's one of the largest pharma company, continued to be the top loser from the Sensex pack for the second successive day and finished sharply lower by 14.01 per cent. Among other losers, HDFC Bank dipped by 11.26 per cent, ICICI Bank by 8.72 per cent, Hindalco by 8.30 per cent, Rel Com by 7.22 per cent, HDFC by 6.86 per cent, BHEL 6.66 per cent, Wipro 6.54 per cent, SBI 6.35 per cent, DLF 6.33 per cent, REL Infra 6.14 per cent, Jaipra Asso by 6.04 per cent, Tata Steel 5.42 per cent and RIL 3.42 per cent. The market breadth was extremely negative with 2,105 counters registering sharp to moderate losses while only 535 ending with gains. The trading volume declined further to Rs 4,304.08 crore from Rs 4,474.95 crore on Monday. Ranbaxy topped the list of highest traded securities with a turnover of Rs 304.67 crore followed by RIL (Rs 279.44 crore), Reliance Capital (Rs 261.81 crore), Infosys Tech (Rs 168.27 crore) and KSK Energy (Rs 131.52 crore). The broad-based BSE-100 Index dropped by 335.14 points or 4.79 per cent to 6,659.96 from previous close of 6,995.10. The BSE-200 index and the dollex-200 were quoted sharply lower at 1,561.52 and 600.68 at close from their last close of 1,636.78 and 634.62 respectively. (PTI)   Articles Blogs Conversations Placements Events