Business
Sensex closes 50 points down; capital goods stocks plunge
Mumbai, March 25
A benchmark index of Indian
equities markets, the 30-scrip BSE Sensitive Index (Sensex), closed
Wednesday's trade down 50 points or 0.18 percent.
The wider
50-scrip Nifty of the National Stock Exchange (NSE) also closed the
day's trade in the red. It was down 12.15 points or 0.14 percent at
8,530.80 points.
The Sensex of the S&P Bombay Stock Exchange
(BSE), which opened at 28,216.09 points, closed the day's trade at
28,111.83 points, down 49.89 points or 0.18 percent from the previous
day's close at 28,161.72 points.
The Sensex touched a high of 28,249.60 points and a low of 28,031.42 points in the intra-day trade.
Healthy
buying was observed in healthcare, automobile, information technology
(IT), technology, entertainment and media (TECK) and consumer durables
sectors.
However, capital goods, metal, bank, oil and gas and power came under selling pressure.
The
S&P BSE healthcare index surged 82.94 points, followed by
automobile index augmented by 61.04 points, IT index gained 38.25
points, TECK index rose 18.17 points and consumer durables index was
higher by 8.33 points.
However, the S&P BSE capital goods
index was down 279.13 points, metal index decreased by 93.04 points,
bank index declined by 62.79 points, oil and gas index lost 52.54
points, and power index was lower by 25.02 points.
The major
Sensex gainers on Wednesday were: Tata Motors, up 1.56 percent at
Rs.541.20; ICICI Bank, up 1.51 percent at Rs.316.75; Wipro, up 1.36
percent at Rs.660.40; Sun Pharma, up 1.29 percent at Rs.1,053.30; and
Mahindra and Mahindra, up 1.21 percent at Rs.1,207.95.
The losers
were: NTPC, down 3.51 percent at Rs.147.25; GAIL, down 2.54 percent at
Rs.380.10; Larsen and Toubro (L&T), down 2.31 percent at
Rs.1,633.10; Coal India, down 2.11 percent at Rs.362.30; and State Bank
of India (SBI), down 1.87 percent at Rs.265.35.
Among the Asian
markets, Japan's Nikkei went up by 0.17 percent and Hong Kong's Hang
Seng closed higher by 0.53 percent. However, China's Shanghai Composite
Index lost by 0.79 percent.
In Europe, London's FTSE 100 was down
by 0.15 percent, France's CAC 40 was lower by 0.62 percent and
Germany's DAX Index lost 0.74 percent at the closing in the Indian
markets.