Sensex Falls Over 150 Points, Nifty Trades Below 16,550; IT, Metals Stocks Drag

Indian equity benchmarks on Monday fell in opening deals, dragged by information technology and metal stocks.

Trends on the Nifty Futures on Singapore Exchange (SGX Nifty) indicated a gap-down start for the domestic indices.

The 30-share BSE Sensex slipped 176 points or 0.32 per cent to 55,593, while the broader NSE Nifty moved 54 points or 0.32 per cent down to trade at 16,531.

Mid- and small-cap shares were negative as Nifty Midcap 100 shed 0.18 per cent and small-cap dropped 0.35 per cent.

14 out of the 15 sector gauges — compiled by the National Stock Exchange — were trading in the red. Sub-indexes Nifty IT and Nifty Metal were underperforming the NSE platform by falling as much as 1.97 per cent and 1.27 per cent.

On the stock-specific front, Tech Mahindra was the top Nifty loser as the stock cracked 2.54 per cent to ₹ 1,118.70. Wipro, BPCL, Britannia and Bajaj Finserv were also among the laggards.

The overall market breadth was weak as 850 shares were advancing while 1,785 were declining on BSE.

On the 30-share BSE index, TechM, Wipro, Bajaj Finserv, Infosys, Hindustan Unilever, Asian Paints, TCS, HCL Tech, Titan, Tata Steel, SBI and Bharti Airtel were among the top losers.

In contrast, NTPC, M&M, Axis Bank and Sun Pharma were trading in the green.

Sensex had slipped 49 points or 0.09 per cent to close at 55,769 on Friday, while Nifty had moved 44 points or 0.26 per cent down to settle at 16,584.