The Indian equity benchmarks fell for second straight session on Friday on the back of losses in banking, metal and financial services shares. The Sensex fell as much as 685 points and Nifty 50 index dropped below its important psychological level of 15,000. ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank, HDFC, Infosys, State Bank of India and IndusInd Bank were among the top drags on the Sensex.
The Sensex ended 441 points lower at 50,405 and Nifty 50 index fell 143 points to close at 14,938.
Selling pressure was broad-based as all the 11 sector gauges compiled by the National Stock Exchange ended lower led by the Nifty PSU Bank index’s over 3.5 per cent fall. Nifty Bank, Financial Services, IT, Pharma, Metal, Private Bank and Realty indexes also dropped over a per cent each.
Mid- and small-cap shares were also faced selling pressure as Nifty Midcap 100 and Nifty Smallcap 100 indexes dropped up to 2 per cent.
Heranba Industries made a stellar stock market debut on exchanges on Friday. Heranba Industries shares opened for trading at Rs 900 on the BSE compared with its issue price of Rs 627 marking a gain of 44 per cent over the price at which shares were sold in the initial public offering (IPO).
MTAR Technologies shares were in huge demand in the ongoing share sale via IPO. MTAR Technologies IPO was subscribed 100.22 times as of 2:10 pm on the final day of subscription, data from the National Stock Exchange showed.
IndusInd Bank, Wipro, Tata Motors, Hindalco, UPL, Tata Steel, State Bank of India, ICICI Bank, JSW Steel, Power Grid, Bajaj Finserv, Shree Cements and Bharti Airtel also dropped between 2-4.5 per cent.
On the flipside, GAIL, ONGC, Maruti Suzuki, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Hero MotoCorp, Nestle India and Hindustan Unilever were among the notable gainers.
The overall market breadth was extremely negative as 1,904 shares ended lower while 1,083 closed higher on the BSE.
