Volatile Sensex, Nifty trade marginally lower; Asia slips

The BSE Sensex and NSE Nifty started off trade on a lower note on Tuesday following global downtrend due to endless Greek and Spain concerns.

The market is closely watching industrial output data today - CNBC-TV18 poll sees April IIP at 1.08% as against -3.5% in the previous month.

The BSE benchmark was down 40.44 points to 16,627.57 and the NSE benchmark declined 13.20 points to 5,040.90.

Asian markets were down 0.6-1% today as market experts feel euro 100 billion will subordinate current Spanish debt and will add significantly to Spain's debt/GDP. They also worried about an eventual bailout request from Italy.

Back home, Reliance Infrastructure, JP Associates, Cairn, Sesa Goa, ICICI Bank, Axis Bank, PNB, Bank of Baroda, SBI, HCL Tech, Wipro, Hindalco, SAIL, BHEL and L&T fell in early trade.

However, BPCL and ONGC outperformed, rising 1.6% and 0.7%, respectively due to falling crude oil prices. WTI crude fell over 1% to USD 81.7 a barrel today.

Bajaj Auto, Infosys, HDFC and HDFC Bank too were on buyers' radar.

The CNX Midcap Index declined 27 points to 6,985. About two shares declined for every share rising on the National Stock Exchange.

In the second line shares, Kingfisher Airlines surged 3% and GIPCL gained 2%.

Pipavav Defence, Indraprastha Gas and Raymond moved up 1-1.5%.

Trading favourites like NCC, GMR Infra, HCC, Indiabulls Real, Educomp Solutions, Suzlon Energy, SKS Microfinance and GVK Power were down 1-2%.