Sensex touches historic low

MUMBAI, SEPT. 17. Stocks went into a tailspin and the Sensex once again came crashing down like a pack of cards on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) today on mounting concerns over an anticipated plunge in U.S. stocks ahead of its reopening after four days.

Players were jittery about the sentiment on the New York Stock Exchange when it reopens this evening after being closed since last week's terrorists attacks on the U.S. as shares of certain sectors that have suffered heavy losses from the tragedy were expected to get severe beating.

The BSE barometer opened with a wide downside gap at 2758.16 and almost hit eight-year low dipping to 2640.58 at early stages due to unabated sell-off by foreign institutional investors (FIIs) amidst a stocks plunge on major regional markets like Tokyo, Hong Kong, Singapore and Sydney.The Sensex had touched a low of 2636.90 during trading on November 5, 1993.

However, the market later recovered partially on small purchases by domestic funds and some foreign funds following reports that Government might hike FII investment limit to 74 per cent and introduce margin trading shortly.

The Sensex later recovered marginally from its lows and close at 2680.98 as against last Friday's close of 2830.12, a net fall of 149.14 points or 5.27 per cent. The broad-based BSE-100 index also collapsed by 87.81 points to 1249.21 from the previous close of 1337.02.

Today's fall was attributed to growing concerns that the U.S. economy which was increasingly weak before Tuesday's terrorist attacks might be pushed into deep recession in case of international conflict that seemed imminent now.

FIIs, particularly the U.S. based funds' seem to be in no mood to make any fresh investments unless they recover from the shock of the devastation of the twin World Trade Centers that once housed their offices.

Commenting on reports of a likely hike in investment limit for FIIs, brokers, however, said it has no way helped sentiment although the recovery started after the news landed.

Fresh onslaught was directed more on technology stocks and some of them were locked in the 20 per cent lower circuit filer till close.

Moser Baer, Hughes Software, CME, Polaris and Global Telesystem, all technology scrips, were stuck in 20 per cent lower circuit while ACC, Infosys, NIIT, Satyam Computer and SBI from derivatives segment were locked in 10 per cent lower price band at close.

In the specified group, 169 including 28 index-based counters registered hefty losses.

The BSE-200 index and the Dollex-200 were quoted sharply down at 273.42 and 94.48 compared with last weekend's close of 292.56 and 102.11 respectively.

- PTI

Send this article to Friends by E-Mail

Section  : Business
Previous : Bullion rates
Next     : Rupee under pressure