E-Paper
Sensex slides 77 points on Monday
Sensex shed 76.81 points to end at 6,106.43 as poor earnings from banks and selling by foreign funds weighed on investors.
Indian shares fell more than one per cent on Monday as poor earnings from banks and selling by foreign funds weighed on investors at the start of an abbreviated trading week.
Banks and software services firms led the slide, which outweighed sparkling earnings from auto makers Maruti Udyog Ltd and Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd.
The 30-share Bombay Stock Exchange index -- Sensex ended down 76.81 points or 1.24 per cent at 6,106.43 points. Losers beat gainers nearly two to one in modest trade of 148 million shares. The index has lost 7.5 per cent in 2005.
The 50-issue National Stock Exchange index -- Nifty dropped 0.85 per cent to 1,909 points.
"We've had poor numbers from banks on lower treasury income, and traders are reducing their positions ahead of the holiday (on Wednesday) and the derivatives contracts expiry (on Thursday)," said managing director of Dimensional Securities, Ajit Surana.
"Since sentiment is negative, bad earnings numbers are doing more harm than the positive effect of good numbers," he said.
Foreign institutional investors have sold more than $160 million worth of shares so far this month, after purchases of a record $8.5 billion in 2004.
Higher global crude prices on colder weather in the United States depressed top private-sector refiner Reliance Industries Ltd, which fell 0.9 per cent to Rs 506.50 after rising early on strong earnings.
