Market in bear clutch, Sensex loses over 700 pts

Key indices further extended losses and hit the day's low in mid-afternoon trade. The Nifty tumbled below the 14,550 level. All the sectoral indices on the NSE traded in the red. Trading was volatile due to expiry of weekly index options on the NSE.

At 14:29 IST, the barometer index, the S&P BSE Sensex, tumbled 718 points or 1.44% at 49,082.19. The Nifty 50 index slipped 202.75 points or 1.38% at 14,518.

A combination of increasing domestic COVID-19 cases, high crude oil prices and rising US bond yields hurt investors' sentiment. The yield on the benchmark 10-year US Treasury note hovered at 1.728%.

In broader market, the S&P BSE Mid-Cap index tumbled 1.63% while the S&P BSE Small-Cap index slipped 2.1%.

The market breadth was weak. On the BSE, 655 shares rose and 2260 shares fell. A total of 138 shares were unchanged.

COVID-19 Update:

With a huge spike of 35,871 fresh coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours, the highest daily rise since early December, India continues to see a surge in Covid caseload. The government yesterday said a total of 70 districts in 16 states have seen an increase of more than 150% in active cases between March 1 and 15.

India reported 2,52,364 active cases of COVID-19 infection and 1,59,216 deaths while 1,10,63,025 patients have been discharged, according to the data from the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare, Government of India.

Total COVID-19 confirmed cases worldwide stood at 12,11,58,726 with 26,80,220 deaths.

Losers in Broader Market:

Info Edge (down 5.72%), Bank of India (down 5.69%), GMR Infra (down 5.34%), Honeywell Automation (down 4.7%) and Ashok Leyland (down 4.19%) were top losers in BSE Mid Cap index.

Infibeam Avenues (down 12.4%), Windsor Machines (down 9.48%), Elecon Engineering (down 9.16%), Saregama India (down 8.77%) and Banco Products (down 8.6%) were top losers in BSE Small Cap index.

Numbers to Track:

In the commodities market, Brent crude for May 2021 settlement fell 78 cents to $67.22 a barrel. The contract fell 0.57% to settle at $68 a barrel in the previous session.

The yield on India's 10-year benchmark federal paper rose to 6.222% as compared to its previous close of 6.185%.

In the foreign exchange market, the partially convertible rupee remained unchanged at 72.55

MCX Gold futures for 5 April 2021 settlement rose 0.37% to Rs 45,008.

The US Dollar index (DXY), which tracks the greenback's value against a basket of currencies, rose 0.18% to 91.6.

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