Markets end lower fifth straight day; Sensex drops 283 points

Financials and select index heavyweights were the top losers

Markets ended lower for the fifth straight session weighed down by financials and select index heavyweights.

The 30-share Sensex provisionally ended down 283 points at  26,486 and the 50-share Nifty ended down 78 points at 8,037.
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(Updated at 2:25PM)

Benchmark share indices are seen heading towards fifth straight day of losses with financials and select index heavyweights leading the decline on concerns of foreign fund outflows after robust US jobs data raised hopes that the US Fed may hike interest sooner than expected.

Further, investors also remained cautious ahead of CAD data due later today while the ongoing Greek debt crises and decline in the Rupee also weighed on sentiment.

At 2:25PM, the Sensex was down by 175 points at 26,593 levels while the Nifty was quoting at 8,061 levels, down by 54 points.

RUPEE

The rupee weakened further and was down at 64.14 against the dollar on the back of higher dollar demand from banks and importers.

SECTORS & STOCKS

All sectoral indices on the BSE were trading lower with BSE Consumer Durables and Oil & Gas indices leading the decline, down over 1.5% each.

Vedanta has slipped over 3% after, its subsidiary and one of the largest independent oil and gas exploration and production companies in India, Cairn India dropped over 3% on further decline in crude oil prices.

Tata Motors dropped over 2.5% as the slowdown in Chinese markets is likely to hit its revenue from its luxury brand JLR.

Index heavyweight Reliance Industries was down nearly 2% on further decline in crude prices. On Friday, OPEC agreed to keep the production target of 30 million barrels of oil per day unchanged which is likely to add to the further decline in the oil prices due to oversupply glut.

Financials continued to witness profit taking on concerns that further rate cuts could be delayed after the RBI raised its inflation forecast for January 2016. HDFC was down 2%, HDFC Bank and SBI were down over 1.2% each.

Coal India, Indian state-controlled coal mining company, trimmed early gains. The stock had surged earlier on the back of upgrades by foreign brokerages.

Among other shares, Eros zoomed nearly 14% on reports of delisting buzz.

SpiceJet surged 4% after chairman and main promoter Ajay Singh has decided to infuse capital for fleet expansion.

Drug maker Wockhardt is trading lower by 5% to Rs 1,329 after the company recalled over 200 bottles of Captopril tablets, used in treatment of blood pressure, and Clarithromycin antibiotic tablets manufactured in the US because of deviations in current good manufacturing practice norms stated by US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

Sun TV has cracked 21% on reports that the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has struck down the proposal by the Information and Broadcasting (I&B) Ministry for giving security clearance to 33 television channels of Sun TV Network.

Opto Circuits has gained over 5% after the company announced that its US-based group firm Cardiac Science Corporation (CSC) won a case against Zoll Medical Corporation over its patented wearable defibrillator technology.

In the broader markets the BSE Midcap and Smallcap indices were down 1.4-1.5% each.

Market breadth continued to remain weak with 1,785 losers and 718 gainers on the BSE.