Sensex Plunges Over 1,500 Points, Nifty Sinks Below 11,200 As Coronavirus Spooks Global Markets

Fears coronavirus will cause recession in major economies hurt markets Sensex slumps to 38,551.54, Nifty to 11,269.80 - lowest since mid-October Official GDP data for October-December period due at 5:30 pm

Edited by Sandeep Singh (with inputs from agencies)

28 Feb 2020, 03:19 PM IST

All the 11 sectoral indices on the NSE, and all the 50 shares in the Nifty basket suffered losses

At 3:15 pm, the Sensex traded 1,430.27 points - or 3.60 per cent - lower at 38,315.39, while the Nifty was down 441.60 points - or 3.80 per cent - at 11,191.7. All the 11 sectoral indices on the National Stock Exchange (NSE), and all of the 50 shares in the Nifty basket suffered losses at the time.
Top losers on the 50-scrip benchmark index were Vedanta (down 12.68 per cent), Tata Motors (11.39 per cent), Mahindra & Mahindra (7.94 per cent), Tata Steel (7.61 per cent), Tech Mahindra (7.54 per cent), Hindalco (7.45 per cent), HCL Tech (7.04 per cent) and Bajaj Finance (6.26 per cent). Reliance Industries, HDFC, Infosys, TCS and ICICI Bank were the biggest drags on the Sensex, together accounting for a fall of more than 600 points in the index.
Hopes the coronavirus would be contained to China vanished on Friday as infections spread rapidly around the world, countries started stockpiling medical equipment and investors took flight in expectation of a global recession.
According to analysts, the increase in the number of coronavirus cases highlighted the risk of world economy taking a bigger blow than anticipated earlier.
"Until last week, the market was of the view that coronavirus is going to have only a minimum impact on global economy... An increase in the number of new cases is changing the view," said Vinod Nair, head of research at Geojit Financial Services. "There are fears of some slowdown in the economy."
Some also say the spread of the pandemic beyond China is forcing investors to reassess the potential risk to global business. “The fear factor in markets is going up as the coronavirus is spreading across countries,” said Rusmik Oza, senior VP (head of fundamental research-PCG) at Kotak Securities.
Equities in global markets were headed for the worst week since the depths of the 2008 financial crisis as investors ditched risky assets on fears the coronavirus would become a pandemic and derail economic growth. Asian stocks tracked another overnight plunge in Wall Street's benchmarks on Friday with the markets in China, Japan and South Korea posting heavy losses.
MSCI's regional index excluding Japan shed 1.4 per cent. Japan's Nikkei plunged 3.3 per cent on rising fears the Olympics planned in July-August may be called off due to the coronavirus. MSCI's all-country world index fell 0.3 per cent after a 3.3 per cent drop on Thursday, having lost 9.2 per cent so far this week and on course for its biggest weekly decline since a 9.8 per cent plunge in November 2008.
Back home, analysts awaited official data on gross domestic product (GDP) due at 5:30 pm for any signs of revival in the economy, which is staring at its worst pace of annual expansion since the 2008-09 global financial crisis. Many economists expect GDP growth to pick up to 4.7 per cent in October-December, from 4.5 per cent in the previous quarter.
On Thursday, the S&P BSE Sensex index had ended 143.30 points - or 0.36 per cent - lower at 39,745.66 and broader NSE Nifty benchmark settled at 11,633.30, down 45.20 points - or 0.39 per cent - from the previous close, declining for the fifth session in a row.