Market runs into European headwinds, Sensex down 114 pts

The markets let go of the winning momentum of the past three days, with the Sensex slumping 114 points after Europe turned shaky over talk of withdrawal of ECB stimulus and on profit-booking in recent outperformers.

There is heightened speculation, especially after comments from top US Federal Reserve officials that a rate hike is coming before the end of this year.

“Speculation over a taper in ECB’s stimulus measures has pushed global bond yields on a rise and kept European equity markets under vigil. As a result domestic investors are cautious,” said Vinod Nair, head of research, Geojit BNP Paribas Financial Services.

Slower services growth in September added to the worries. The Nikkei India Services PMI stood at 52 in September, down from August's 54.7, a slower rate of expansion.

The 30-share index settled lower by 113.57 points, or 0.40 per cent, at 28,220.98.

The gauge, which rose over 91 points after a surprise 0.25 per cent rate cut by RBI in its policy review on Tuesday, had gained 507.02 points in the previous three sessions.

The NSE Nifty reclaimed the 8,800-mark, but could not hold on to it under the selling pressure. It closed down 25.20 points, or 0.29 per cent, at 8,743.95. In the beginning, the mood was one of big optimism on IMF growth upgrade for India to 7.6 per cent for 2016-17, which pushed up buying. But soon, this gave way to profit-booking in recent gainers, led by banking and auto, and weak global cues further pushed down the indices into negative territory.

In stock-specific action, ONGC plunged 2.56 per cent to Rs 266.75 while Axis Bank lost 2.03 per cent to Rs 535.70, mainly after investors booked profit. Those that lagged included Bajaj Auto, Hero MotoCorp, M&M, Dr Reddy’s, ICICI Bank, Adani Ports and TCS, falling by up to 1.28 per cent. Out of 30 Sensex shares, 19 ended lower while 11 gained. The BSE banking index fell the most by 0.78 per cent. Others such as IT, technology, healthcare and oil and gas too suffered losses.

The broader markets gave a better account, with the small-cap index gaining 0.62 per cent and mid-cap 0.50 per cent. Foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) snapped up shares worth net Rs 344.13 crore on Tuesday, showed provisional data. Asian indices closed higher, but Europe was in a spot of bother amid investor worries the ECB is moving towards a tighter monetary policy.

Japan's Nikkei rose 0.50 per cent while Hong Kong's Hang Seng closed 0.34 per cent higher. Chinese financial markets remained closed for a public holiday.

London's FTSE was down 0.49 per cent, Frankfurt's DAX 0.70 per cent and France's Paris CAC 40 0.90 per cent.