Asian stocks, barring Taiwan that ended up, closed mostly

lower following mixed cues from Wall Street and ahead of European Central Bank's policy decision later today. However, Europe was trading higher in early trades as stock indices in France, Germany and UK were up marginally. Back home, 18 out of 30 Sensex-based scrips closed down and 12 counters settled higher. Major losers from the Sensex were Sterlite Ind (2.92 pc), NTPC (2.72 pc, Cipla (2.61 pc), Gail India (2.29 pc), Bharti Airtel (2.08 pc), Tata Power (1.97 pc), Tata Steel (1.66 pc), Hero MotoCorp (1.65 pc), Jindal Steel (1.37 pc), BHEL (1.22 pc), L&T (1.22 pc), SBI (1.02 pc) and ICICI Bank (0.84 pc). However, M&M rose by 1.26 per cent, followed by TCS (1.20 pc), Tata Motors (0.89 pc) and Infosys (0.56 pc). Among the sectoral indices, the BSE-CD dipped by 3.34 per cent, followed by BSE-Realty (1.47 pc, BSE-Power (1.39 pc), BSE-Metal (1.16 pc) and BSE-CG (1.12 pc). The market breadth turned negative with 1,378 shares losing ground as against 799 finishing up. 786 stocks were unchanged. The total turnover was relatively up at Rs 2,189.41 crore from Rs 2,097.69 crore yesterday. Foreign institutional investors continued their buying spree by investing a net Rs 1,137.95 crore yesterday as per provisional data from the stock exchanges.