Sensex falls below 28,000

In choppy trade, the BSE benchmark Sensex on Tuesday cut down its losses and ended down by over 28 points on selling in interest-sensitive stocks after higher retail inflation dashed hopes of a rate cut by the Reserve Bank of India. The retail inflation surged to eight-month high of 5.4 per cent in June. Meanwhile, deflationary trends continued for the eighth month in a row in June, with the wholesale inflation slipping to (-) 2.4 per cent, official data showed on Tuesday. The Sensex opened higher at 27,987 and quickly regained the 28,000-mark to touch a high of 28,018, as pace of buying picked up, in line with firm global cues after the Greece bailout deal. Profit-booking kicked in after recent gains, and with a weak opening at European markets, the Sensex slipped into the negative zone to hit a low of 27,854 before settling down 28.29 points, 0.1 per cent, at 27,939.

The gauge had gained 387.53 points in the past two straight sessions.

During the day, oil stocks took the centre-stage after Iran reached a landmark deal with six major world powers. Aban Offshore surged 16.16 per cent after.

Stocks of state-run oil marketing companies such as HPCL, BPCL and IOC registered gains up to 3.09 per cent following the deal amid a tumbling crude oil price overseas.

Globally, Brent crude tumbled almost 2 per cent and was trading below USD 57 a barrel level.

On similar lines, the NSE Nifty after shuttling between 8,480.25 and 8,424.10 finally settled down by 5.55 points, or 0.07 per cent, at 8,454.10.

Stock of Tata Motors topped the losers list by plunging 4.10 per cent after Jaguar Land Rover cut its sales target in China.

Other major losers were Hindalco, SBI, Vedanta, Tata Steel, RIL, ITC, HDFC, ICICI Bank, Bharti Airtel, ONGC, TCS and HDFC Bank.

Shares of India Cements saw huge selling pressure and ended 3.66 per cent lower after its franchisee Chennai Super Kings was suspended from IPL for two years.

Among 30 Sensex components, 13 stocks ended down while 16 finished higher. L&T remained unchanged.

Sectorally, the BSE Auto index suffered the most by falling 0.93 per cent, followed by realty, banking and capital goods.

However, the BSE small-cap index ended 0.36 per cent higher while mid-cap index added 0.14 per cent.

Provisional data showed that foreign portfolio investors bought shares worth net Rs 527.98 crore yesterday.

Globally, other Asian markets ended mixed as China's Shanghai Composite ended the day lower while European markets were down in their early trade.