The Sensex and the Nifty plunged nearly 1.1 per cent at the closing session on Friday due to all-round selling by funds and retail investors led by weak global cues.
Global sentiment was dampened as geopolitical tensions worsened in Iraq and Russia. Stocks around the world declined as >US President Barack Obama authorised air strikes in Iraq.
Obama said that he has authorised air strikes against militants in Iraq if they threaten US personnel, and he dispatched planes to drop food and water for trapped civilians threatened with “genocide''.
The 30-share BSE index Sensex plunged 259.87 points to end at 25,329.14 and the 50-share NSE index dropped 80.70 points to end at 7,568.55.
Barring FMCG and healthcare, all other BSE sectoral indices ended significantly in the red. Among them, realty index fell the most by 3.86 per cent, followed by metal 3.15 per cent, power 2.92 per cent and capital goods 2.5 per cent. On the other hand, FMCG index was up 0.09 per cent and healthcare 0.05 per cent.
Among 30-share Sensex constituents, SSLT (-5.71 per cent), Tata Power (-3.79 per cent), BHEL (-3.74 per cent), Tata Steel (-3.22 per cent) and GAIL (-2.85 per cent), while the only four gainers were Bharti Airtel (+2.09 per cent), Dr Reddy's (+0.89 per cent), ITC (+0.72 per cent), Cipla (+0.32 per cent) and TCS (+0.23 per cent).
European stocks dropped a third day, with equity gauges in France and Germany sliding more than 10 per cent from their highs.
The Stoxx Europe 600 Index declined 0.9 per cent to 324.09 at 9.56 a.m. in London. Standard & Poor’s 500 Index futures fell 0.4 per cent, while the MSCI Asia Pacific Index plunged 1.4 per cent, the most since May.
Germany’s DAX Index has dropped 11 per cent from a record on July 3, meeting the common definition of a correction. France’s CAC 40 Index is down 9.9 percent since reaching a six-year high on June 10, after earlier falling as much as 11 per cent since then. The U.K.’s FTSE 100 Index has fallen 4.6 per cent from its 14-year high on May 14.