Sensex, Nifty Fall Most In Three Weeks As Coronavirus Roils Global Markets

The S&P BSE Sensex and NSE Nifty 50 indexes plunged the most since Budget day as spread of coronavirus to other countries outside mainland China plagued the global market sentiment. The Sensex slumped as much as 864 points at the day's lowest level and the Nifty 50 index touched an intraday low of 11,813. Concerns about global economic growth getting impacted by the rising number of coronavirus cases outside China badly hurt the market sentiment. The European markets, including CAC, DAX and FTSE, had crashed more than 3 per cent in early trades. And the Dow futures slid by over 600 points or 3 per cent in pre-market trades.

The Sensex plunged 807 points or 2 per cent to close at 40,363 and the Nifty 50 index dropped 251 points or 2 per cent to shut shop at 11,829.

AK Prabhakar, Head of Research, IDBI Capital, said, "There is global selloff as the coronavirus is affecting travel and business worldwide. Coronavirus is no longer restricted to China, but has spread to countries such as Italy, Iran and South Korea. It is a global business breakdown. Nifty can fall to 11,400-11,200 levels, he added.

All the 11 sector gauges compiled by the National Stock Exchange ended lower led by the Nifty Metal index's over 5 per cent fall. Metal shares fell on the back of huge inventory levels in Chinese manufacturing units, which is very negative for metal companies globally, Mr Prabhakar said.

Auto, PSU Bank, Pharma, Realty, Bank and FMCG sector gauges also fell between 1.5-3.5 per cent each.

Mid- and small-cap shares also faced selling pressure as both the indexes on NSE dropped nearly 2 per cent each.

All shares in the Nifty 50 basket closed lower in trade on Monday.

JSW Steel was top loser in the Nifty 50 basket of shares; the stock fell 7.35 per cent to Rs 261.10. Vedanta, Tata Steel, Hindalco, Tata Motors, ONGC, Eicher Motors, Bharti Infratel, Maruti Suzuki, Grasim Industries and Titan also fell 3.4-6.5 per cent each.

The overall market breadth was extremely bearish as 1,293 shares closed lower while 524 ended higher on the BSE.