Stock Market: Sensex Falls 152 Points, Nifty Trades Below 18,350 Amid Volatility. IT Index Leads

Stock update: Dr Reddy's, ICICI Bank, State Bank of India, ITC, HUL, Titan, Reliance, HDFC twins, and others were the major losers on the BSE platform

Sensex and Nifty, the two key equity benchmark that opened in the green amid positive cues from global markets and unabated foreign fund inflows on Monday, erased gains in early trade and declined tracking volatility.

At 10.30 am, the BSE Sensex was down by 152 points to 61,642, while the broader NSE Nifty was trading at 18,336, down 13 points.

On the 30-share Sensex platform, Dr Reddy's, ICICI Bank, State Bank of India, ITC, HUL, Titan, Reliance, HDFC twins, and others were the major losers. On the flip side, Power Grid, Tata Steel, Kotak Mahindra Bank, HCL Technologies, Mahindra & Mahindra and UltraTech Cement were the prime winners in early trade.

In the broader market, the BSE Midcap and Smallcap indices were up to 0.3 per cent higher.

Sectorwise, the Nifty pharma index exhibited most weakness, slipping over 1 per cent. Media index was another top laggard, down nearly 2 per cent. While IT pack held firm gains of up to 0.6 per cent.

Among individual stocks, LIC rallied 7 per cent after the company posted 11 times higher profit in Q2 over the last year.

"The momentum in the market is evident in the 4 straight weeks of gains and FIIs turning buyers in all the last 11 trading days," said V K Vijayakumar, Chief Investment Strategist at Geojit Financial Services.

Elsewhere in Asia, markets in Seoul, Shanghai and Hong Kong were trading higher, while Tokyo quoted lower. Wall Street had ended higher on Friday.

In the previous session on Friday, the BSE benchmark had zoomed 1,181 points (1.95 per cent) to settle at 61,795, while the Nifty rallied 321 points (1.78 per cent) to finish at 18,349.

International oil benchmark Brent crude was trading 0.43 per cent higher at $96.40 per barrel.

Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) were net buyers on Friday as they bought shares worth Rs 3,958.23 crore, as per exchange data.

Meanwhile, the rupee witnessed heavy volatility in early trade on Monday and depreciated 15 paise to 80.93 against the US dollar in line with a muted trend in domestic equities.

At the interbank foreign exchange, the domestic unit opened on a strong note at 80.53 against the dollar, then pared the gains to quote at 80.93, registering a loss of 15 paise over its previous close. On Friday, the rupee appreciated by 62 paise to close at 80.78 against the dollar.