Stock market closed: No change in US Fed’s interest rate, stock market fell, heavy fall in Sensex-Nifty

Mumbai. Domestic stock markets witnessed a sharp decline on Thursday due to selling by investors disappointed by the US Federal Reserve’s decision to keep repo rates stable. BSE Sensex fell 2,496.89 points (3.26 percent) to close at 74,207.24. The Nifty-50 index of the National Stock Exchange (NSE) also fell by 775.65 points to 23,002.15. This is the lowest level of both in more than 11 months.

The US central bank decided to keep policy rates steady between 3.5 per cent and 3.75 per cent at its two-day meeting that ended on Wednesday. Due to this, there was a big fall in the stock markets of America as well as Asia and Europe. The Sensex itself started with a fall of 1,953 points at 74,751 points. Although it climbed up to 75,354 points immediately after opening, its graph gradually started going down.

Its low was 73,951 points. The graph of Nifty also remained similar. The selling in the market was so widespread that all the indices and all the sectors closed in the red. The Midcap-50 index of medium-sized companies fell by 3.29 percent and the Smallcap-100 index fell by 2.94 percent. The auto sector index fell by more than four percent.

Finance, banking, IT, metals and consumer durables groups in NSE witnessed a decline of more than three per cent. The lowest decline of 1.98 percent was seen in the index of oil and gas sector. All Sensex companies closed in the red. Eternal’s shares fell by more than five and a half percent. Shares of Bajaj Finance, Mahindra & Mahindra and HDFC Bank also fell more than five percent.

L&T, IndiGo, Bajaj Finserv and Trent fell by more than four per cent. Shares of Axis Bank, Infosys, Maruti Suzuki, TCS, HCL Technologies, Asian Paints, Tech Mahindra, UltraTech Cement, Adani Ports and ICICI Bank slipped between three to four per cent. Shares of BEL, Titan, Tata Steel, Hindustan Unilever, Kotak Mahindra Bank, ITC, Sun Pharma, State Bank of India, Reliance Industries, Bharti Airtel and NTPC fell by one to three percent.