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Hong Kong fall hits BSE, Sensex plunges 73 points

Political uncertainty at the Centre coupled with a record fall in share prices at the Hong Kong stock exchange on Thursday badly affected market sentiments on the country's premier bourse, the Bombay Stock Exchange, resulting in a heavy fall in stocks prices.

The BSE Sensitive Index fell by 72.93 points or 1.82 per cent in a single trading session. The Sensex has lost nearly 148 points in the last three consecutive trading sessions on the BSE.

Foreign institutional investors sold heavily on the prime counters and there was no follow-up support from domestic institutional investors as well as speculators, leading BSE brokers said.

Market leaders Reliance, ITC and TISCO suffered major losses during the course of the day while the side market was also relatively weak, traders informed.

The Hong Kong stocks suffered their worst fall in a decade on Thursday in a burst of panic selling triggered by rocketing interest rates and fears that the vibrant Hong Kong economy may be infected by the turmoil prevailing elsewhere in Asia.

The Hang Seng shed 14 per cent in trading during the early hours before recovering mildly.

BSE President M G Damani said, "It seems the FIIs are booking profit by selling heavily on the Indian bourses, following the nervous trends in other Asian stock markets, especially Hong Kong. It has certainly affected the market sentiments here. The political uncertainty prevailing at the Centre in the wake of the Uttar Pradesh issue is worrying us.

"Though the Reserve Bank of India's credit policy is very good, the announcement has come at a disturbing time and therefore, could not have an immediate positive impact on the stock market," he said.

Reflecting the downtrend, the BSE Sensitive Index opened at 4073.42 points, touched the day's high of 4080.12, declined below the 4000 mark to touch the day's low of 3983.18 points, and later closed at 4009.77 points, showing a net loss of 72.93 points over the previous close.

Similarly, the broadbased National Index declined by 32.58 points to 1726.36 points as against Wednesday's close of 1758.94 points. The BSE-200 and Dollex Indices also drifted lower by 6.58 and 3.13 points to 387.33 and 178.04 points over the previous close of 393.91 and 181.17 points respectively.

The GDR market also exhibited a downtrend as the Skindia GDR Index declined by 0.05 per cent to 76.07 points as against previous close of 76.11 points. The Skindia GDR Index p/e also drifted lower by 0.10 per cent to 19.78 points against 19.80 points, according to a spokesperson at the Skindia Finance, an international investor group.

Meanwhile, the total turnover on the BSE declined further to Rs 7.8 billion as against Wednesday's Rs 769.18 million.

Market leader Reliance Industries Limited has registered an highest turnover of Rs 2.6 billion, followed by ITC Rs 1.5 billion, SBI Rs 859.9 million, Tata Tea Rs 548.4 million and Castrol Rs 278.6 million.

Hectic activity was also observed at the other counters like ICICI Ltd Rs 135.6 million, BHEL Rs 130.5 million, Bajaj Auto Rs 104.8 million, MTNL Rs 103.6 million, Hind Petrol Rs 101.5 million, TELCO Rs 82.2 million, Hind Lever Rs 80.7 million, Escorts Rs 77.4 million and ACC Rs 6.92 million.

Good transactions were also witnessed at some counters in B1 group like Madras Cem, Marico Indus, Infosys Tech, Tata Vashist, Satyam Comp, Bank of Baroda and LML.

The Reliance scrip today fell by Rs 7.50 to Rs 404.00 as against previous close of Rs 411.50, State Bank drifted lower by 8.25 to Rs 274.00 from Rs 282.25, TISCO down by Rs 3 to Rs 172.50 and ITC moved down by Rs 7 to Rs 309.75.

Among others, ACC, Arvind Mills, Colgate, Dr Reddy, Escorts, GE Ship, Glaxo, Hero Honda, Hind Lever, Hindalco, Lakme, Ponds and TELCO also registered sharp losses over their previous day's closing levels.

UNI