Sensex crashes over 900 points: Rs 3.9L cr investor wealth lost; Balrampur Chini Mills, HAL & Adani Total Gas down up to 7%

Indian equity benchmarks fell sharply in afternoon deals on Monday, dragged by metal, technology, banks and financials. The BSE Sensex slumped over 900 points while the NSE barometer Nifty hit the sub-16,850 level. At 1:20 pm, the 30-pack Sensex was down 901 points or 1.57 per cent at 57,087. The NSE benchmark was down 266 points or 1.55 per cent at 16,834. Such was the fall in the domestic indices that nearly Rs 3.90 lakh crore of BSE market capitalisation (m-cap) was wiped out. The domestic benchmarks cracked today on worries of risks in the global banking system despite a historic Swiss-backed acquisition of troubled Credit Suisse by UBS Group offering some relief.

VK Vijayakumar, Chief Investment Strategist at Geojit Financial Services, said, "The fears of financial contagion arising from the banking crisis in the US and Europe appear to be largely contained by the quick response of the governments and central banks. The big learning from the global financial crisis of 2008 is that the failure of large financial institutions will lead to systemic issues leading to financial contagion and ultimately to recession. Learning from this crisis, this time there has been a concerted global action - the latest being the buyout of Credit Suisse by UBS - to contain the crisis."

Here's a look at today's market fall in numbers:

Rs 3.90 lakh crore investor wealth lost

Investor wealth, as suggested by the BSE m-cap, fell Rs 3.90 lakh crore to Rs 253.62 lakh crore compared with a valuation of Rs 257.52 lakh crore recorded in the previous session. Frontline stocks such as Reliance Industries, HDFC twins (HDFC and HDFC Bank), Infosys, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Bajaj Finance and State Bank of India (SBI) contributed to the fall today.

332 stocks hit 52-week lows on BSE

As many as 332 stocks hit their 52-week lows today. BSE 500 stocks such as Aarti Drugs, AAVAS Financiers, Alkyl Amines Chemcicals, Balaji Amines, Bata India, Biocon, Bluedart, Century Ply, Crompton and Emami hit their respective one-year low levels. Yet, 83 stocks touched their one-year high levels today.

2,633 stocks in the red

Out of 3,637 stocks, 2,633 stocks were seen declining. Only 879 stocks were advancing, while 125 stocks remained unchanged.

Balrampur Chini Mills, HAL, Adani Total Gas down up to 7%

Shares of Balrampur Chini Mills, Hindustan Aeronautics, India Cements, IRB Infrastructure Developers, Deepak Fertilisers, National Aluminium and Macrotech Developers fell up to 6.65 per cent in afternoon deals today.

Metal, IT, banks & financials top drags

For Sensex, the major culprits that dragged the index lower were Reliance, HDFC duo, Infosys, TCS, ICICI Bank, Bajaj Finance, SBI, L&T, Bajaj Finserv, Tata Steel, Tata Motors and UltraTech Cements. RIL, HDFC twins, Infosys and TCS alone contributed negatively to around a 380-point decline.

On NSE, All 15 sub-indices were down. Nifty IT, Nifty Metal, Nifty Bank, Nifty Financial Services and Nifty Auto fell sharply.

FII-DII data

Foreign institutional investors sold Rs 1,766.53 crore worth of equities on a net basis on Friday, while domestic investors bought about Rs 1,817.14 crore worth of shares, as per provisional NSE data.

On the global front, Asian markets were mostly seen trading mixed. Japan's Nikkei index fell 1.42 per cent, South Korea's Kospi index was down 0.69 per cent, Hong Kong's Hang Seng tanked 2.57 per cent and Shanghai Composite index slipped 0.48 per cent. Wall Street equities plunged on Friday. Further, US stock futures indicated a gap-down start for Wall Street later in the day.

Also read: UBS acquisition of Credit Suisse, US banking turmoil: What's in it for domestic stocks?

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