Sensex down 430 points; bank stocks fall

Mumbai, March 13:

A benchmark index of Indian equities markets, the 30-scrip BSE Sensitive Index, made heavy losses during the late afternoon trade session Friday. The Sensex was down 430 points or 1.48 percent as interest sensitive sectors like banking, capital goods and automobile declined.

The wider 50-scrip Nifty of the National Stock Exchange (NSE) also made losses during the late afternoon session. It was trading down 124.15 points or 1.41 percent at 8,651.85 points.

The Sensex of the S&P Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), which opened at 29,134.93 points, was trading at 28,500.90 points (2.30 p.m.), down 429.51 points or 1.48 percent from the previous day’s close at 28,930.41 points.

The Sensex touched a high of 29,183.76 points and a low of 28,492.42 points in the trade so far.

All sector-based indices of the BSE were trading in the red except for realty index. Heavy selling was observed in interest sensitive sectors like banking, capital goods and automobile.

Other sectors like healthcare, fast moving consumer goods (FMCG), information technology (IT) and oil and gas too came under heavy selling pressure.

The BSE S&P bank index was down 446.68 points, capital goods index was lower by 368.52 points, automobile index came down by 341.93 points, healthcare index fell 213.50 points, FMCG index declined by 155.21 points, IT index decreased by 132.51 points and oil and gas index lost 121.05 points.

However, the S&P BSE realty index was marginally up by 3.60 points.

(IANS)