Opening Bell: Benchmark indices open in red; sectoral indices drop up to 2.2%

On Thursday, Nifty futures on the Singapore Exchange were seen trading 140.50 points, or 0.87% down at the 16,027 level. This indicated a gap down start for Thursday’s trading session.

On Wednesday, US stocks ended steeply lower, with the Nasdaq contracting more than 3% and the Dow dropping for a fifth straight trading session due to a cautious outlook for interest rates and the economy. The oil prices relaxed in the early trade post climbing more than 5% in the previous session following new Russian sanctions on some European gas companies.

At the open, the Sensex was down 589.10 points or 1.09% at 53499.29, and the Nifty was down 169.30 points or 1.05% at 15997.80. India VIX jumped 7.16% reaching 24.44 in the initial hour of the trading session.

ONGC, Bajaj Auto, Power Grid Corporation, Eicher Motors and Divis Labs were among the major gainers on the Nifty, while losers were Britannia Industries, Bajaj Finance, HDFC Bank, Hero MotoCorp and Bajaj Finserv. Meanwhile, on Sensex, the only gainer was only Power Grid Corporation of India whereas the top losers were HDFC Bank, Bajaj Finance, L&T, Bajaj Finserv and Maruti Suzuki.

In the broader markets, at 9.50 am BSE Mid Cap and Small Cap indices traded lower, being down 1.96% and up 1.85%, respectively. In the BSE Midcap index, the top losing stocks dragging the index were Federal Bank, Adani Power, IDFC First Bank, Sriram Transport Finance and TVS Motor Company losing up to 3.9% whereas, in BSE Smallcap index, Venus Remedies, Agi Greenpac, Birla Tyres, Elgi Equipments and Prism Johnson were the top losers.

On the sectoral front, indices traded in red were metals, auto, consumer durables, power, realty, telecom and finance indices fell more than 2% whereas the rest of the indices traded almost a % lower. BSE Telecom index dropped 2.22% pulled down by Tata Teleservices (Maharashtra), GTL Infrastructure, Sterlite Technologies, MTNL and Tejas Networks.