Investors woke up to a Black Friday as equity indices in early trade crashed by nearly 10% as coronavirus panic intensified.
At 10 am, the BSE S&P Sensex was down by 3,091 points (9.43%) to 29,688 while the Nifty 50 cracked by 966 points (10.07%) to 8,624.
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The trading was halted for the 45 minutes as the Nifty hit a 10% lower circuit. All sectoral indices at the National Stock Exchange were floating in red with Nifty IT down by 13.15%, PSU bank by 12.96%, metal by 11.83% and auto by 11.38%.
Among stocks, Kotak Mahindra Bank was the top loser after dropping by over 20% at Rs 1,172.05 per share. Bharat Petroleum Corporation slipped by 16.7%, GAIL by 15.3% and ONGC by 14%.
IT majors HCL Technologies, Tech Mahindra and Tata Consultancy Services suffered losses of 15.8%, 15% and 14% respectively. The other prominent losers were IndusInd Bank and Adani Ports.
Global stock markets also crashed with coronavirus panic selling hitting almost every asset class. Japan’s Nikkei dropped as far as 10% and headed for its worst week since the 2008 financial crisis.
The World Health Organisation (WHO) on Wednesday declared coronavirus a global pandemic and US President Donald Trump announced a 30-day ban on travel from Europe to the United States to prevent the outbreak of the virus.
(With ANI Inputs)