Share Market Crash: Nifty50 slides to 25,250, Sensex sheds 1,769 points amid market-wide sell-off as investors stare at Middle East

Share Market Crash: Domestic equity benchmarks plummeted on Thursday, tracking weakness across most global markets, as investors worried about an escalating conflict in the Middle East. Both headline indices plunged up to 2.2 per cent in the second half of the day, with the Nifty50 index tumbling as much as 566.6 points to  25,230.3 and the Sensex sliding 1,832.3 points to hit 82,434. The market-wide sell-off hit all sectors, with financial, energy, auto, and IT shares leading the decline. The Sensex ended 1,769.2 points lower at 82,497.1 while Nifty50 settled at 25,250.1, down 546.8 points. Many analysts attribute the market fall to growing concerns over the Middle East's escalating geopolitical tensions, sparked by Iran's ballistic missile strikes on Israel. Also contributing to the fall include FII outflows and dwindling hopes for swift interest rate cuts.

Here are 10 key things to know about Thursday's market crash: 

• Investors lost Rs 9.7 lakh crore in wealth as the market capitalisation of BSE-listed companies decreased to Rs 465.2 lakh crore at the end of trade from Rs 474.9 lakh crore on Tuesday, according to provisional exchange data. 
• Barring two stocks, JSW Steel (up 1.3 per cent) and ONGC (up 0.4 per cent), all Nifty50 constituents finished the day in the red, with BPCL, Shriram Finance, and Larsen & Toubro--closing around 4-5 per cent lower each--being the worst hit. Other blue-chip stocks falling the most including Reliance (4.0 per cent), Axis Bank (4.0 per cent), Asian Paints (3.8 per cent), Tata Motors (3.8 per cent), Bajaj Finance (3.7 per cent, Eicher Motors (3.6 per cent), and Maruti Suzuki India (3.6 per cent). 
• Reliance, HDFC Bank, and Larsen & Toubro were also the biggest contributors to the loss in Nifty50 and Sensex. 

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• The Nifty Bank index--whose 12 constituents include some of the country's largest lenders including SBI and HDFC Bank--tanked 1,239.2 points, or 2.3 per cent, to 51,683.4 at the lowest level of the day. 

• NSE's India VIX index--also known as the fear index in market parlance--rose 9.9 per cent for the day to settle at 13.2, having surged as much as 16.2 per cent during the session. 
• Broader indices also bore the brunt of the wild sell-off on Dalal Street, with Nifty Midcap 100, BSE Midcap, Nifty Smallcap 100, and BSE Smallcap finished the day 1.8-2.3 per cent lower. Overall market breadth was extremely negative with only two stocks rising against every five falling. This was reflected in an advance-decline ratio of 2:5 as 1,118 stocks ended higher while 2,869 closed lower on BSE.

• Market veteran Ajay Bagga believes there are five major reasons behind the crash. "With Chinese stimulus leading to clustered buying by FIIs and then to selling by FIIs of other emerging markets stocks, India has seen high FII net outflows over the last few days. Secondly, the geopolitical risk and fear that the Iran-Israel war could broaden and that Iran could react by shutting off access to the Persian Gulf for ships... Oil prices could rise massively if that happens and economies like India that import most of their crude requirements from the Gulf oil producers could face inflation, and balance of payments-related issues," Bagga told Zeebiz.com.

• "Thirdly, domestic issues like a regulatory clampdown on the F&O segment that is hurting sentiment and will impact flows going ahead. Then US data is showing economic strength, which means that Fed rate cuts will be slower than factored in. Finally, the Japanese policy roller coaster is impacting carry trade sentiment. There is a near consensus that there will be one more rate hike by December by the Bank of Japan. There are trillions of dollars still to be unwound from the carry trade and that will lead to subdued markets if the Japanese rate hike outlook is not controlled," explained the expert. 

• European markets began the day in the red with the Stoxx 600 last trading 0.7 per cent lower, mirroring a sea of losses across much of Asia. Dow futures were down half a per cent at the last count, indicating a weak start ahead on Wall Street.
• Earlier on Thursday, MSCI's broadest index of Asia Pacific shares outside Japan lost 1.2 per cent.

With inputs from agencies

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