Mumbai: Stocks plummeted to multi-week lows on across the board sell-off as concerns about macroeconomic woes amid growing worries over a looming US government shutdown frayed nerves of investors.
The 50-share Nifty plunged by a massive 97.90 points, or 1.68 per cent, to finish at 5,735.30 on the National Stock Exchange (NSE).
Banking index was the top loser among the sectoral indices, followed by fmcg, energy, auto, metal, capital goods and realty.
The sentiment was also rattled by a stand-off in the US over its government's proposal to raise country's debt ceiling, and weaker than expected China's manufacturing growth data amid renewed euro zone concerns over a political instability in Italy.
Against the backdrop of global uncertainty, trading got off to a sluggish start with the equity indices falling below the important 5,800 level amid frantic unwinding by investors.
It remained under intense selling pressure throughout the session, breaching all support levels in the absence of any low level buying.
Lingering concerns of rising interest rates and a further deterioration in macro-economic fundamentals ahead of June quarter current account deficit data release mainly prompted investors to book profits, traders commented.
NMDC, Tata Steel, JP Associates, ICICI Bank, Coal India, BHEL, L&T, HDFC, DLF and PNB were the biggest laggards among the Nifty stocks.
The notable gainers included ACC, Hindustan Unilever, HCL Tech, BPCL, Lupin, Sun Pharma, Cairn, Infosys and GAIL.
Turnover in the cash segment declined to Rs 9,400.34 crore from 9,541.29 crore yesterday. A total of 4,907.51 lakh shares changed hands in 55,90,137 trades.
The market capitalisation stood at Rs 61,91,626 crore.
