Equity indices slip by 1.5 pc in early trade, auto and realty stocks drag

Equity benchmark indices slipped by over 1.5 per cent during early hours on Monday in line with Asian peers with auto and realty stocks suffering deep losses.

As the country braced for an extension of the 21-day lockdown to contain the spread of coronavirus, market sentiment was hit with global crude oil prices jumping by more than one dollar a barrel after top producers agreed to their biggest-ever output cut.

At 10:15 am, the BSE S & P Sensex was down by 508 points or 1.63 per cent at 30,652 while the Nifty 50 edged lower by 137 points or 1.5 per cent at 8,975.

Except for Nifty pharma, all sectoral indices at the National Stock Exchange were in the red with Nifty auto skidding by 4.6 per cent, realty by 4.2 per cent, financial service by 3.1 per cent and private bank by 2.8 per cent.

Among stocks, Mahindra & Mahindra dropped by 6.8 per cent to Rs 355.25 per share while Maruti lost by 5.9 per cent, Bajaj Auto by 4.6 per cent and Hero MotoCorp by 3.6 per cent.

Bajaj Finance fell by 7.9 per cent, Bajaj Finserv by 4.8 per cent, Titan by 5 per cent, ONGC by 4.4 per cent and Axis Bank by 4.2 per cent.

However, pharma majors Dr Reddy's and Cipla gained by 2.2 per cent and 1.5 per cent respectively. Bharti Airtel, Infosys, Larsen & Toubro and Tata Consultancy Services too traded with a positive bias.

Meanwhile, global shares fell as investors looked for more signs of economic damage from the coronavirus pandemic. The Nikkei fell by 1.4 per cent while MSCI's broadest index of Asia Pacific shares outside Japan slipped slightly, with South Korean shares falling by 0.9 per cent.

Financial markets Hong Kong were closed while in mainland China, the CSI300 index lost by 0.6 per cent in early trade.

A group of oil producing countries known as OPEC+ which includes Russia said it had agreed to reduce output by 9.7 million barrels per day for May and June after four days of marathon talks.

International benchmark Brent futures LCOc1 rose by 5.5 per cent to 33.22 dollars per barrel.