Sensex - biggest fall in 4 years

It was bloodbath in markets on Friday with sensex crashing 769.41 points, the biggest fall in 4 years, to end at 18,598 on fresh concerns about US stimulus withdrawal and rupee plunging to record low of 62, draining investor wealth by Rs 2 lakh crore.

After gaining 703 points in the last four sessions, the sensex plunged 769.41 points, or 3.97 per cent, to 18,598.18 on all-round selling. Consumer durables, realty, banks and metal sector took major beating.

The broad-based National Stock Exchange index Nifty nosedived by 234.45 points, or 4.08 per cent to 5,507.83, after touching day's low of 5,496.05. Also, SX40 index, the flagship index of MCX-SX, closed at 11,083.52, down 428.63 points or 3.72 per cent.

In 30-share sensex pack, barring Hero MotoCorp, all stocks closed with heavy losses. Major losers were Reliance Industries (4.62 %), Sterlite Ind (6.65 %), ONGC (6.06 %), Jindal Steel (5.46 %) and L&T (5.19 %) and Maruti (4.84 %).

Others like SBI (3.32 %), BHEL (10.70 %), GAIL (6.49 %), HDFC (5.81 %), HDFC Bank (5.05 %) and ICICI Bank (5.02 %) also bore the brunt of investor selling.

Brokers said a weak trend in Asian and European markets on speculation that US Federal Reserve might roll back monetary stimulus after jobless claims in US declined to lowest level since 2007, further influenced the market.

Sectorally, the consumer durable sector index suffered the most by losing 8.38 per cent to 5,893.26, followed by realty index by 6.07 per cent to 1,263.77. Metal index fell by 5.56 per cent to 6,953.89 and bank index by 5.55 per cent to 10,800.62.