Sensex drops 241 pts, Nifty falls for 7th day on selling in IT, oil shares

Mumbai, Nov 18 (PTI) Benchmark Sensex declined by 241 points while broader Nifty fell for the seventh session in a row on Monday following a sell-off in IT and oil shares amid unabated foreign fund outflows and weak leads from the US markets.

The 30-share BSE Sensex dropped by 241.30 points or 0.31 per cent to settle at 77,339.01, registering its fourth day of decline. During the day, it fell 615.25 points or 0.79 per cent to 76,965.06.

Falling for the seventh day in a row, the NSE Nifty dipped 78.90 points or 0.34 per cent to 23,453.80.

From the 30-share Sensex pack, Tata Consultancy Services, Infosys, NTPC, HCL Technologies, Axis Bank, Tech Mahindra, Bajaj Finserv, Sun Pharma, IndusInd Bank and Reliance Industries were the major laggards.

Tata Steel, Hindustan Unilever, Mahindra & Mahindra, Nestle and State Bank of India were among the gainers.

Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) offloaded equities worth ₹1,849.87 crore on Thursday, according to exchange data. Foreign investors have pulled out ₹22,420 crore from the Indian equity markets so far this month, owing to high domestic stock valuations, increasing allocations to China, and the rising US dollar as well as Treasury yields.

With this sell-off, Foreign Portfolio Investors (FPIs) have recorded a total outflow of ₹15,827 crore in 2024 so far.

Equity markets were closed on Friday for Guru Nanak Jayanti.

"Consolidation continued in the market; a slowdown in earnings growth and a weak rupee due to inflation impacted the sentiment. IT stocks reacted negatively today due to a reduced expectation of a Fed rate cut in December, which may pose a delay in spending in the BFSI segment," Vinod Nair, Head of Research, Geojit Financial Services, said.

The BSE smallcap index declined 0.69 per cent and midcap index dipped 0.17 per cent.

Among sectoral indices, BSE IT dropped the most by 2.34 per cent, followed by teck (1.99 per cent), oil & gas (1.64 per cent), energy (1.21 per cent), utilities (1.04 per cent) and power (0.58 per cent).

Metal jumped 2.14 per cent, while realty (0.62 per cent), auto (0.58 per cent), services (0.53 per cent), consumer durables (0.29 per cent) and bankex (0.22 per cent) also emerged as gainers.

As many as 2,486 stocks declined while 1,611 advanced and 127 remained unchanged on the BSE.

In Asian markets, Seoul and Hong Kong settled higher while Tokyo and Shanghai ended lower. European markets were trading in the negative territory. The US markets ended lower on Friday.

Global oil benchmark Brent crude climbed 0.49 per cent to USD 71.39 a barrel.

The BSE benchmark Sensex dropped 110.64 points or 0.14 per cent to settle at 77,580.31 on Thursday. The Nifty declined by 26.35 points or 0.11 per cent to 23,532.70.