Sensex falls 171 on weak rupee, Asia woes; ADAG stocks soar

Equity benchmarks lost nearly one percent Monday on weak Asian cues and sharp rupee depreciation. Fears of Federal Reserve may wind down its USD 85 billion monthly bond buying programme after strong US jobs data also added fuel to the fire, but 1-2 percent upside in European markets helped the Sensex cut losses by 139 points from day's low.

The 30-share BSE benchmark slipped 171.05 points or 0.88 percent to close at 19324.77.

The NSE Nifty fell 54.05 points to finish at 5813.85 after hitting an intraday low of 5775.55, but the broader markets outperformed benchmarks. The BSE Midcap Index closed flat and Smallcap lost just 0.4 percent.

Jeff Chowdhry, Head of Emerging Market Equities at F&C Investments says the market is continuing to worry about the fact that obviously the Federal Reserve is looking to undertake tapering.

China’s Shanghai dropped 2.44 percent on news that Beijing will no longer extend credit to sectors that struggle with overcapacity spooked mainland investors, reports CNBC.com.

Meanwhile, European markets gained 1-2 percent ahead of eurozone finance ministers of 17 nations meeting for Greece package. Also Read - Greek bailout new fear factor, fed tapering done deal: RBS

Back home, Indian rupee touched a record low of 61.21 on dollar demand in early trade today, but it rose above 61 level to close at 60.62, down 40 paise compared to Friday’s closing value of 60.22 per dollar.

Rupee likely to remain volatile going forward, says Ananth Narayan of Standard Chartered Bank after rupee breaches 61 against dollar on Monday. Currently, he expects rupee to be in the range of 58-62/USD.

Financials, oil & gas, metals and Auto stocks were under pressure.
Shares of HDFC, ICICI Bank, ONGC, Tata Motors, M&M, NTPC and Coal India declined 2-3.5 percent.

Capital goods major BHEL topped the buying list in late trade, gaining 2.3 percent followed by ITC, Sun Pharma, Wipro and Dr Reddys Labs with 0.7-1.5 percent gains. Infosys gained 0.7 percent ahead of first quarter earnings scheduled to be announced on Friday.

Anil Dhirubhai Ambani group-led stocks gained quite smartly. Reliance Communications jumped 7 percent after the company decided to demerge its realty business into separate company Reliance Properties. Reliance Power rose 5 percent while Reliance Infrastructure and Reliance Capital gained over 2 percent.

Among midcaps, Havells India rallied 5 percent as Morgan Stanley is overweight on the stock with a target price of Rs 878.

Foreign institutional investors have net sold Rs 204.46 crore worth of equity shares today, as per provisional data available on the NSE.