Investors become poorer by Rs 7.94 lakh crore as stock markets tumble

Investors' wealth diminished by Rs 7.94 lakh crore on Friday as markets tumbled after a record-breaking rally.

The 30-share BSE Sensex tanked 738.81 points or 0.91 per cent to settle at 80,604.65 after hitting a fresh all-time high of 81,587.76 in initial trade.

Tracking the bearish trend in equities, the market capitalisation of BSE-listed firms eroded by Rs 7,94,059.53 crore to Rs 4,46,38,826.75 crore (USD 5.34 trillion).In the past four days, the BSE benchmark had rallied 1,446.12 points or 1.80 per cent. 

The benchmark hit lifetime high levels for the fifth straight session till Friday.

"The domestic market closed on Friday with a downturn due to the global sell-off, triggered by operating system issues that caused devices to crash worldwide."The global IT outrage has led to disruptions in various Indian industries. The overvalued market is also experiencing profit booking ahead of the budget next week," said Vinod Nair, Head of Research, Geojit Financial Services.

Among the Sensex pack, Tata Steel tumbled over 5 per cent while JSW Steel tanked more than 4 per cent.NTPC, Tata Motors, UltraTech Cement, Tech Mahindra, Power Grid, Mahindra & Mahindra, Bajaj Finance and Reliance Industries were the other major laggards.Infosys climbed nearly 2 per cent after the IT major reported a 7 per cent rise in consolidated net profit at Rs 6,368 crore in the April-June quarter and raised its growth outlook for the current financial year, signalling an improvement in the IT segment.

ITC, Asian Paints and HCL Technologies were the other gainers.

In the broader market, the BSE midcap gauge tanked 2.31 per cent and smallcap index dropped 2.22 per cent.

All the indices ended lower, with metal plunging 4.11 per cent, commodities tanking 3.07 per cent, oil & gas (2.87 per cent), power (2.67 per cent), auto (2.53 per cent), utilities (2.51 per cent), realty (2.44 per cent) and services (2.42 per cent).

"Overall markets got impacted due to new tensions between the US and China which resulted in global profit booking. In addition, the Microsoft outage impacted a lot of large organizations, airlines and stock exchanges globally."Investors are also cautious ahead of the Union Budget next week which will provide the next set of directions to the market," Siddhartha Khemka, Head - Retail Research, Motilal Oswal Financial Services Ltd, said.