FINAL TRADE: Bloodbath on D-Street! Sensex tanks 1,628 pts, Nifty slides to 21,572; HDFC Bank sinks 9%

Stock market today: Barring the technology pack, bears dominated every pocket of Dalal Street on Wednesday, January 17, as weak global cues and disappointing numbers by the banking giant HDFC Bank dented investor sentiment. Both benchmark indices, the S&P BSE Sensex and the NSE Nifty, witnessed one of the worst days today.

The Nifty index witnessed a fall of 481.85 points during the intra-day session and ended 460.35 points, or 2.09 per cent, lower at 21,571.95. Sensex crashed as much as nearly 1,700 points during the session and later at 1,628.01 points, or 2.23 per cent, lower at 71,500.76. It was the second day of fall for the indices.

The high-beta Nifty Bank index, whose 12 constituents include SBI, HDFC Bank, and ICICI Bank, sank 2,060.65 points, or 4.28 per cent to settle at 46,064.45. Nifty SamllCap 100 and Nifty MidCap 100, both settled over one per cent lower.

HDFC Bank, Tata Steel, Kotak Bank, and Axis Bank were among the top losers, down nearly 8–3 per cent in the Nifty basket. On the other hand, Apollo Hospitals, HCLTech, Tech Mahindra, SBI Life, and LTIMindtree were among the top gainers, trading with gains of around one per cent.

"A nosedive correction in banking stocks, along with concerns over delays in US FED rate cuts, impacted market sentiments. The addition of discouraging Chinese growth data and rising US bond yields also resulted in widespread profit-booking." Vinod Nair, Head of Research, Geojit Financial Services, said.

"Given the elevated valuations, coupled with the fact that optimism regarding earnings and GDP growth for FY24 is already reflected in the market, this triggered the correction," Nair added.

Global Market

European shares extended losses on Wednesday as more hawkish remarks from European Central Bank (ECB) officials tempered interest rate cut expectations, while glum economic data from China further soured investor sentiment.

The pan-European STOXX 600 was down 1.4 per cent by 0920 GMT, hitting its lowest level in more than a month. In the latest remarks from policymakers, ECB President Christine Lagarde said the central bank is on track to get inflation back to its 2 per cent target, but victory has not yet been won, while Dutch central bank chief Klass Knot said markets are getting ahead of themselves in pricing monetary easing.

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