Sensex, Nifty still under pressure; Tata Steel, BHEL outperform

Moneycontrol Bureau12:20 pm Oil slides: Oil prices hit their lowest since 2003 today, as the market braced for a jump in Iranian exports after the lifting of sanctions against the country at the weekend.

The UN nuclear watchdog on Saturday said Tehran had met its commitments to curtail its nuclear program, and the United States immediately revoked sanctions that had slashed the OPEC member's oil exports by around 2 million barrels per day (bpd) since their pre-sanctions 2011 peak to little more than 1 million bpd.

Iran is ready to increase its crude exports by 500,000 bpd, its deputy oil minister said on Sunday.

International Brent crude fell to USD 27.67 a barrel early today, its lowest since 2003, before recovering to USD 28.42, still down 1.8 percent from its settlement on Friday. US crude was down 51 cents at USD 28.91 a barrel, after hitting a 2003-low of USD 28.36 earlier in the session.

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Equity benchmarks as well as broader markets continued to be under pressure in noon trade following correction in Asian markets, weighed down by oil, banking & financials, infra and auto stocks. However, technology and FMCG stocks limited downside.

The 30-share BSE Sensex declined 124.18 points to 24330.86 and the 50-share NSE Nifty slipped 37.70 points to 7400.10. The market breadth remained in favour of declines; more than seven shares fell for every share advancing on the Bombay Stock Exchange.

The BSE Midcap was down 1.5 percent and Smallcap crashed 2.9 percent.

Tata Steel and BHEL outperformed, rising more than 2 percent followed by Axis Bank, GAIL, Infosys, TCS, ITC and HUL.

HDFC Bank, Reliance Industries, HDFC, ONGC, L&T, Bajaj Auto, Tata Motors and Bharti Airtel were negative contributors to Sensex's fall, down 1-3 percent.

Asian markets barring China traded in red. Hang Seng and Nikkei were down more than 1 percent while Shanghai gained 1 percent. The Australian market finished session in the red, with the main ASX 200 index closing down 35 points at 4,857.80, nearing bear market territory after falling 18.78 percent from its 52-week high of 5,982.69 in April 2015.