The markets tumbled in late trades owing to heavy selling across the board. Early gainers like metal and PSU stocks too ended in red. The realty, banking and IT stocks turned out to be the major losers today.

Globally world markets were down today ahead of the Federal Reserve chairman commnets on the world's largest economgy - US. The Asian markets ended in red, with the Nikkei down almost 1%. The European markets were a tad in red.

However, our markets compounded to fact that some profit taking was overdue after the markets had risen to fresh 30-months high last week. The Sensex today touched a high of 18,248, but tumbled to a low of 17,944 - down 304 points from the day's high. The Sensex finally settled with a loss of 228 points at 17,998. The NSE Nifty ended with a loss of 69 points at 5409.

The BSE Realty index tumbled 2.7% to 3380. The Bankex and IT index were down around 2% each at 12,216 and 5408, respectively.

The market breadth too turned negative at close. Out of 3,059 stocks traded on the BSE, 2,071 declined and 883 advanced today.

DLF, Hero Honda and ICICI Bank tumbled around 3% each to Rs 308, Rs 1,785 and Rs 958, respectively.

Tata Power, Jaiprakash Associates and Jindal Steel shed around 2.5% each at Rs 1,236, Rs 112 and Rs 689, respectively.

Reliance Infrastructure, SBI, TCS and Infosys were down around 2% each.

ONGC, however, surged nearly 3% to Rs 1,318, and Tata Steel added 1.7% to Rs 510.

Among major realty losers - Sobha Developers tanked nearly 4% to Rs 339. HDIL, Parsvnath, Unitech, Phoenix Mills and Peninsula Land were the other major losers.

MOST ACTIVE COUNTERS

Piramal Healthcare topped the value chart with a turnover of Rs 508.85 crore on the BSE. It was followed by Prakash Steel (Rs 302.70 cr), Great Offshore (Rs 180.75 cr), Tata Steel (Rs 136.51 cr) and Relaince (Rs 127.47 cr).

FCS Software led the volume chart with trades of around 17.62 million shares followed by Prakash Steel (15.30 mn), Ispat Industries (11.45 mn), Piramal Healthcare (10.20 mn) and Assam Company (7.63 mn).

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