The Bank Nifty presented a splash of red this morning with 11 of the 12 Bank Nifty stocks down with only HDFC Bank managing to stay in the green, but barely.
Many of the PSU bank stocks crashed to fresh 52-week lows in the early minutes of trading. The selling could also be because it was the last day of the contract but any significant recovery from the lows may take a while.
PNB, Canara Bank, Union Bank of India and Bank of India were the stocks to hit new yearly lows while Bank of Baroda came very close to do so.
PNB slipped to a new low of Rs 659.20 before recovering marginally to Rs 660.90. Canara Bank fell to a new yearly low of Rs 308.15 before pulling back to Rs 309.65. Union Bank drifted to a yearly low of Rs 150.30 and Bank of India touched a new low of Rs 254.40 before recovering to Rs 255.50.
Bank of Baroda came very close to breaching its earlier 52 week low of Rs 610 when it touched Rs 611.10. But it managed to recover to Rs 617.
It was not that these shares lost heavily to touch new yearly lows. The loss ranged from Rs 7.30 in the case of BoB to Rs 1.50 in case of Union Bank. But the fact that these bank stocks were hovering close to their early yearly lows made them vulnerable to hitting fresh 52 week lows if the markets turn weak as it happened today.
Other bank heavyweights like SBI (down to Rs 1,825.60, a loss of Rs 4.30), ICICI Bank which was trading at Rs 912.75, down by Rs 3.65, Axis Bank that lost Rs 3.05 to Rs 1015.40 sustained minor losses.
It was only HDFC Bank that managed to stay in the green at Rs 589.35, a gain of just 80 paise.