Tata Motors, UltraTech crash 10% on Religare Tech glitch

A sell order resulting from a software error at Religare Capital Markets caused shares of Tata Motors and UltraTech Cement to crash by 10% each for a few seconds during the last hour of trade on NSE on Friday.

The error, according to market sources, cost the brokerage a Rs 12-15-crore loss. A Religare official said there was no broker error and no loss to any clients.

"There is no impact on client business, and Religare Capital Markets will operate as normal on Monday," the official said. "The matter is being investigated by the software supplier. Religare Capital Markets has discussed the matter with exchange officials. Religare Capital Markets uses third-party software for execution of orders on stock exchanges. Due to some technical issue in the software, unintended transactions got executed," the official said.

An NSE official said the exchange would look into the matter. Tata Motors' shares crashed by 9.98% to Rs 268.25 apiece before recovering to close at Rs 281.65, down 5.4%. UltraTech shares fell as much as 10% to Rs 1,712.35 apiece. The share recovered to close at Rs 1,837.75, down 3.4%. Sources said Ankit Financial Services was one of the beneficiaries of the unintended trades. Incidentally, Ankit Financial was one of the beneficiaries of Emkay Global's Rs 650-crore "freak trade" on NSE on October 5.