Sensex crashes as mkts in bear grip

Selling Across The Board

NSE Nifty falls 348.25 pts to 17,416.55

BSE Sensex plunges 1,170.12 pts to 58,465.89

Bajaj Finance, Bajaj Finserv, RIL, NTPC, Titan and SBI among top losers

Mkts in red for 4th consecutive session

- Barring telecom, metals, remaining indices in the red

- Repealing agri laws impacted PSU stocks

- Bharti Airtel, Asian Paints and PowerGrid move up

Monday Mayhem shaves investors off Rs. 8trn

On Monday alone, investors lost Rs 8.22 lakh crore wealth in the market crash. The market capitalisation (mcap) of BSE-listed firms declined to Rs260.98 lakh crore from Rs 269.20 lakh crore in the previous session. The market breadth was negative as 2,571 stocks declined, 843 scrips advanced and 154 remain unchanged out of the 3,568 stocks traded.

Mumbai: Market benchmark Sensex crashed over 1,170 points to log its worst single-day drop in over seven months on Monday amid concerns over government's reform measures after farm laws repeal announcement and weak listing of India's largest fintech firm Paytm. Extending its losses for the fourth straight session, the BSE gauge plunged 1,170.12 points or 1.96 per cent to settle the day at 58,465.89 – its lowest closing level in over two months. In terms of absolute single-session drop, this was the biggest fall since April 12 this year. Similarly, the NSE Nifty fell 348.25 points or 1.96 per cent to 17,416.55, marking its lowest level seen after September 20.

Among top losers on the Sensex were, Bajaj Finance, Bajaj Finserv, Reliance Industries, NTPC, Titan and SBI – diving as much as 5.74 per cent. Reliance Industries sank over 4 per cent, after the company shelved a proposed deal to sell a 20 per cent stake in its oil refinery and petrochemical business to Saudi Aramco for an asking of $15 billion. On the other hand, Bharti Airtel, Asian Paints and PowerGrid managed to clock gains. One97 Communications, Paytm's parent firm, tumbled over 13 per cent to close at 1,360.30 a share on the BSE. Sectorally, BSE realty, energy, consumer durables, auto, oil and gas, and finance indices fell up to 4.45 per cent, while telecom and metal indices ended with gains. Broader midcap and smallcap indices fell up to 2.96 per cent. "Finally the bears got their act together after a long wait as a series of events over the weekend gave them the upper hand with almost all the sectoral indices barring the metal index plunging. The repealing of the agriculture laws had an impact on the PSU stocks, while the O2C deal not going through left a 4.5 per cent cut on Reliance. Even as IPO investors come to terms with the reality, the inflationary impact on demand across several sectors continues to worry the street," said S Ranganathan, head (research) at LKP Securities.

Vinod Nair, head (research) at Geojit Financial Services, adds: "Subdued listing and continuation of weak trading of Paytm, India's largest new generation fintech, is a big sentimental setback to the domestic market, which was thriving on the strong primary market. It will impact the inflow of money from the retail segment, which has been a key player during the year. Weak inflow from FIIs will possibly get higher due to the withdrawal of three agriculture farm acts which brings a stoppage to government's reformist agendas in context to coming state elections next year. It was a key factor for India to trade at a premium to EMs during the year."

Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) were net sellers in the capital market on Thursday, as they offloaded shares worth Rs 3,930.62 crore, according to exchange data.

Paytm lost $10bn in valuation

Shares of ne 97 Communications Ltd, parent company of Paytm, fell Rs203.85 or 13.03 per cent and closed at Rs1,360.30 on BSE. mcap full is at Rs88,184.67crore ($11.5bn) and mcap FF is at Rs7,054.77crore. The stock fell to Rs1,298 in the afternoon session and it took the market capitalisation (mcap) to $11.2billion from the issue valuation of $19.9billion. The Paytm share price is closer to the target price of Rs1,200 set by Macquarie, a global investment bank as against the issue price of Rs2,150.