NSE Nifty 50 was down by 0.23 per cent, or 51.40 points, to 22,251, while the BSE Sensex was at 73,238, down by 0.31 per cent, or 227.50 points in early trade.

A total of 2,979 stocks were actively traded, 1,527 advanced, 1,352 declined and 100 stocks remained unchanged. And, 83 stocks hit 52-week high and 18 stocks hit 52-week low at 9.50 am on the BSE.

BSE Sensex fell by 500.62 pts or 0.68% at 72,965.77 as of 10.51 am, and Nifty 50 declined by 160.20 pts, or 0.72%, at 22,142.30.

VK Vijayakumar, Chief Investment Strategist, Geojit Financial Services, said, “A major trend in the market now is the aggressive selling by FIIs, which has touched to ₹15,863 crores so far this month. Though DIIs are buying, they are not as aggressive as they were due to some concerns surrounding election results.

“It is important to understand that there is a new factor triggering FII selling, apart from the high US bond yields. This is the outperformance of the Chinese and Hong Kong markets. During the last one month, while Nifty is down 1.5 per cent, the Shanghai Composite is up by 2.62 per cent and Hang Seng is up by a whopping 8.8 per cent. Chinese and Hong Kong markets are cheap with PEs around 10 while India is expensive with double the PE of these markets.”

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So long as this outperformance of the Chinese and Hong Kong market continues, FIIs are likely to sell. The weakness in frontline financials is primarily due to FII selling. For long-term investors, this is an opportunity to buy high quality large caps driven down by FII selling. Previous episodes of FII selling turned out to be good buying opportunities, he added.

Major gainers on the NSE include Hero MotoCorp (4.57%), Bajaj Auto (2.17.%), M&M (1.58%), HCL Tech (1.26%) and Kotak Bank (0.73%). Major losers include L&T (-3.64%), BPCL (-1.68%), Dr Reddy’s Labs (-1.06%), HDFC Life (-1.06%) and Tata Consumer Product (-0.96%).

BSE SmallCap was down by 0.049 per cent and MidCap was down by 0.060 per cent.

Major gainers within the Nifty Auto were Hero MotoCorp (4.57 per cent), TVS Motor (5.59 per cent), M&M (2.95 per cent), Bharat Forge (2.59 per cent), Bajaj Auto (2.58 per cent)

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