Sensex Slips 400 pts At Open, Nifty50 Below 17,800; Key Points

Sensex Today: Domestic equity markets opened lower on Friday amid weak global cues. Frontline indices Nifty50 opened over 100 points lower to trade below 17,800 levels and the S&P BSE Sensex declined over 400 points to trade at 59,533 levels.

Top Gainers & Losers

Tech Mahindra, M&M, Wipro, Maruti Suzuki, Infosys, TCS, contributed to the sharp cuts in benchmark indices. Sun Pharma, Bajaj Finance, Asian Paints, however, helped trim losses.

All sectors plunged in the sea of red – Nifty Auto, Nifty Metal, Nifty IT indices slipped the most, over 1 per cent.

V K Vijayakumar, Chief Investment Strategist, Geojit Financial Services, said: “The market has started showing some indications of fatigue. Globally, the major concern now is that the Fed might oversteer the economy and end up raising rates too much too fast, pushing the US economy into a sharp recession. There are talks of the terminal Fed rate rising to 4.25 per cent. Sharply rising rates, rising bond yields and rising dollar are negatives for equity.”

“In this challenging environment, it would be difficult for India to sustain the decoupling from the global trend which has been a recent pattern in India. Moreover, FIIs have halted their sustained buying and have turned sellers, though this is not yet a trend. Investors may adopt a wait-and-watch attitude till the Fed meeting is over on 21st September. Bank Nifty continues to be strong,” he said.

Global Cues

Asian markets were weaker on Friday as investors braced for a US rate hike next week amid growing concerns of a global recession following warnings from the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.

Tokyo stocks opened lower Friday after Wall Street shares slumped, battered again by worrying economic data and concerns about the impact of further aggressive Federal Reserve action next week.

New US retail sales data gave a mixed view of how consumers are coping with inflation in four decades. The government report showed that retail sales rose an unexpected 0.3 per cent. High prices and central banks’ aggressive plan to raise interest rates as a solution remains the markets’ main focus.

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