Nifty below 5500; ADAG, oil & gas, realty dip

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Equity benchmark extended losses amid a choppy trade in afternoon trade - the Nifty has slipped below the 5,500-mark, dragged down by Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group (ADAG), oil & gas, metal, select power and auto companies' shares. L&T, SBI, ICICI Bank, ITC and Bharti Airtel too were adding pressure on markets.

The market has taken a bit of pause today after the upside seen in previous five sessions. "We had almost a five-day unabated rally in the market. So, little bit of pause is there, we will have to see as to how things develop over next one or two days on the technical front. Market is trading more on technical basis right now than on fundamental basis because most of the news is priced-in in the market. If we do not break the 5,450 levels on the downside, especially on a closing basis, then I think we will possibly trade in this range till expiry," Piyush Garg of ICICI Securities said.

The 30-share BSE Sensex was trading at 18,335, down 171 points and the 50-share NSE Nifty fell 55 points to 5,491. The broader indices too were following the same trend - the BSE Midcap and Smallcap indices lost one percent each.

All sectoral indices were in red. The BSE Realty Index crashed nearly 4%. Auto, Oil & Gas, Capital Goods, Power and Bank indices were down 1-2%.

ADAG companies' shares were extremely under selling pressure. Reliance Communications, Reliance Power, Reliance Infrastructure and Reliance Capital were down 6-9%.

Heavyweights ONGC, L&T and Bharti Airtel tumbled 2-3%. Reliance Industries, TCS, SBI, ICICI Bank and ITC slipped 1-1.5%. Tata Motors and M&M from auto pack tanked 3% each.

SAIL, Tata Steel, Sterlite and DLF declined 2.5%. Jaiprakash Associates plunged over 5%.

However, the buying was seen in BHEL, HUL, Wipro, HDFC, HDFC Bank, JSPL, Sun Pharma, Cipla and Maruti.

Volume was very large today - both exchanges reported turnover of more than Rs 1.6 lakh crore, including F&O turnover of Rs 1.4 lakh crore.

About 247 shares advanced while 1047 shares declined on National Stock Exchange.