By IANS
Mumbai : The Indian capital markets opened weak Wednesday on the back of weak cues from Asian markets. There was heavy selling witnessed across the sectors in the early trades.
At around 10.40 a.m., the benchmark sensitive index (Sensex) of the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) was down by 223.25 points or 1.16 percent at 19,057.55. The broader S&P CNX Nifty of the National Stock Exchange (NSE) declined 97.40 points or 1.68 percent at 5,683.50.
About 1,832 shares have advanced, 1,173 shares declined, and 62 shares are unchanged.
Religare Enterprises got listed on the bourses today at Rs.324 versus its issue price of Rs.185. It’s trading strong at Rs.568 after slipping from its intra day high of Rs.600. Over 5.5 million shares were already traded on the NSE, making its one of the most active counters today.
Asian markets fell Wednesday. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng tumbled 2.58 percent or 717.15 points at 27,054.06, Japan’s Nikkei fell 1.29 percent or 196.09 points at 15,015.43, Singapore’s Straits Times slipped 1.29 percent or 44.52 points at 3,393.75, Taiwan’s Taiwan Weighted dropped 0.38 percent or 33.25 points at 8,647.61 and South Korea’s Seoul Composite plunged 1.19 percent or 22.23 points at 1,850.01.
The Dow Jones industrial average gained 51.70 points, or 0.04 percent to 13,010.14. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index advanced 6.43 points or 0.45 percent to 1,439.70, and the Nasdaq composite index surged 3.43 points, or 0.13 percent to 2,596.81.
Indian floats largely had a mixed outing on the US bourses. VSNL was the major gainer and rose 3.50 percent while Satyam, Wipro, Tata Motors, ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank and Patni Computers ended with steady gains. Among the laggards Rediff and MTNL slumped over three-four percent each while Dr Reddy’s and Infosys were down marginally.
Crude oil prices in the overseas market moved up marginally, with the Nymex light crude oil for January series gaining $3.39 to close at $98.03 a barrel. In the commodity space, the Comex gold for December delivery jumped by $13.40 to settle at $791.40 an ounce.
Top gainers on the Sensex were ITC at Rs.201.10 up 2.26 percent, Tata Steel at Rs.876.40 scaled up 1.99 percent and Suzlon Energy at Rs.2,056.15 advanced 0.99 percent.
Top losers on the Sensex were HDFC Bank at Rs.1,583 down by 2.9 percent, Sun Pharma at Rs.1,074.05 declined 2.38 percent and Wipro at Rs.440 slide down 1.85 percent.