Stock Market: Sensex Sheds 176 Points, Nifty Settles Below 17,400. IT, Metal Stocks Drag, Banks Shine

Stock update: Among the Sensex 30 shares, Tata Steel, Infosys, TCS, Tata Motors, M&M, L&T closed in the red. On the flip side, PowerGrid, ICICI Bank, Kotak Bank, SBI, HDFC, NTPC emerged winners

The two key equity benchmarks, Sensex and Nifty, on Monday extended their losses for the seventh straight trading session amid tepid global cues. The domestic indices tracked weakness in auto, IT, and metal stocks and eventually ended off the day’s low as banking shares bucked the trend and finished with some gains.

The S&P BSE Sensex closed at 59,228, down 176 points. On the other hand, the NSE Nifty settled at 17,392, down 73 points. The Nifty dipped below the 200-DMA to hit a low of 17,299 in intra-day deals, thus breaking the 200-DMA (Daily Moving Average), an important technical level. Technically, the index did manage to close above the 200-DMA at the later part of the day.

Among the Sensex 30 shares, Tata Steel, Infosys, TCS, Tata Motors, M&M, L&T closed in the red. On the flip side, PowerGrid, ICICI Bank, Kotak Bank, SBI, HDFC, NTPC emerged winners.

In the broader markets, the BSE Midcap index down 0.6 per cent and Smallcap index fell 1 per cent.

Sectorwise, except bank and realty, all other sectoral indices ended lower.

In the previous session on Friday, the S&P BSE Sensex fell 142 points (0.24 per cent), to close at 59,464, while the Nifty50 declined 45 points (0.26 per cent) to end at 17,466.

"Bears continued to wreak havoc in the domestic market as the latest data releases from the US heightened the existing worries of aggressive rate hikes. The personal consumption expenditure in the US, which is Fed’s key monitorable of inflation, increased in January, pressuring investors to stay away from equities markets," said Vinod Nair, Head of Research at Geojit Financial Services.

In Asian markets, South Korea, Japan, China, and Hong Kong ended lower. Equity markets in Europe were trading in the green. The US markets had ended sharply down on Friday.

International oil benchmark Brent crude climbed 0.35 per cent to $83.41 per barrel.

Foreign Portfolio Investors (FPIs) offloaded shares worth Rs 1,470.34 crore on Friday, according to exchange data.

Global oil benchmark Brent crude futures advanced 0.46 per cent to $83.54 per barrel.

Meanwhile, the rupee depreciated by 10 paise to close at 82.85 (provisional) against the US currency on Monday as a stronger dollar in the overseas market and a muted trend in domestic equities weighed on investor sentiments.

At the interbank foreign exchange market, the rupee opened at 82.87 against the greenback and closed at 82.85 (provisional), registering a fall of 10 paise over its previous close of 82.75. During the session, the domestic unit witnessed an intra-day high of 82.82 and a low of 82.94 against the American dollar.

Meanwhile, the dollar index, which gauges the greenback's strength against a basket of six currencies, was trading marginally lower at 105.15.