Sensex falls 66 pts on Q1 nos, rate hike fears

Carrying forward its losses since Wednesday, the BSE benchmark Sensex fell over 66 points to 18,436.19 in volatile trading today, as blue-chips led by RIL fell on disappointing quarter earnings posted by many corporates amid weak global cues.

Carrying forward its losses since Wednesday, the BSE benchmark Sensex fell over 66 points to 18,436.19 in volatile trading on Thursday, as blue-chips led by RIL fell on disappointing quarter earnings posted by many corporates amid weak global cues.

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The Bombay Stock Exchange index, Sensex, which had lost 152 points in the previous session, lost another 66.19 points after trading in the range of 18,415.36-18,566.99 intra-day.

Broad-based National Stock Exchange index Nifty fell by 25.45 points to 5,541.60, after moving between 5,578.90 and 5,532.70.

Trading sentiment turned bearish after bio-tech major Biocon and energy solutions provider Exide Industries failed to enthuse markets, as their first quarter earnings missed markets estimates and rising borrowing costs damped demand.

Biocon plunged 1.94 % and Exide Industries by 8.77 %.

The market remained under pressure ahead of the Reserve Bank of India policy meet on Tuesday as investors feared another hike in interest rate to tame a stubborn inflation. Overall inflation rose to 9.44 % in June from 9.06 % in May.

Barring information technologies and teck, all other 11 sectoral indices closed in red. Consumer durable index fell the most at 2.20 %, realty index fell 1.43 %, bank index lost 0.98 %.