Sensex Tumbles Over 600 Points On US Federal Reserve’s Rate Hike Fears, Nifty Trades Below 17,250

Indian equity benchmarks on Friday traded lower in opening deals on aggressive rate hike fears by the U.S. central bank. Asian stocks declined as Japan’s Nikkei lost 1.89 per cent, South Korea’s KOSPI fell 1.11 per cent and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index shed 0.64 per cent.

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

Overnight, U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said a half-point interest rate increase will be “on the table” when the Fed meets in May. Last month, the Fed had raised rates from near zero to a quarter percentage point.

The 30-share BSE Sensex tanked 629 points or 1.09 per cent to 57,283 in early trade, while the broader NSE Nifty moved 176 points or 1.01 per cent down to trade at 17,217.

Mid- and small-cap shares were mixed as Nifty Midcap 100 fell 0.31 per cent and small-cap inched 0.11 per cent higher.

All of the 15 sector gauges — compiled by the National Stock Exchange — were trading in the red. Nifty Auto and Nifty Financial Services were underperforming the index by falling as much as 1.69 per cent and 1.42 per cent, respectively.

On the stock-specific front, Hindalco was the top loser as the stock cracked 3.01 per cent to ₹ 524. M&M, Eicher Motors, HDFC Life and Dr Reddy’s were also among the losers.

The overall market breadth stood slightly positive as 1,363 shares were advancing while 1,218 were declining on BSE.

On the 30-share BSE index, M&M, Dr Reddy’s, Nestle India, SBI, Kotak Mahindra Bank, IndusInd Bank, UltraTech Cement and Bajaj Finserv were among the top laggards.

In contrast, HCL Tech, PowerGrid and Bharti Airtel were trading in the green.

Sensex had surged 874 points or 1.53 per cent to close at 57,912 on Thursday, while Nifty had moved 256 points or 1.49 per cent higher to close at 17,393.