Sensex suffers more losses, slides 214 points on global cues

Mumbai: Benchmark Sensex declined by over 214 points in opening trade on Wednesday, extending yesterday's fall, tracking a weak trend in global markets amid fresh concerns of a possible China-US trade war.

Unabated capital outflows by foreign funds and profit-booking by retail investors too dampened sentiments. There was caution among investors ahead of the May month derivatives expiry tomorrow.

The 30-share index, which had lost 216.24 points in the previous session, drifted down by 214.13 points, or 0.61 per cent, to 34,735.11.

The NSE Nifty cracked below the 10,600-mark by falling 69.45 points, or 0.65 per cent, to 10,563.85.

All sectoral indices led by bank, oil & gas and capital goods were in the negative zone, slipping up to 1.02 per cent.

Brokers said sustained foreign funds outflows, weak trend at other Asian markets and overnight losses at the Wall Street, rattled by renewed concerns of a possible China-US trade war and political uncertainty in Italy, mainly triggered selling here.

Major losers included Hero MotoCorp, Tata Motors, ICICI Bank, Axis Bank, SBI, Bajaj Auto, Bharti Airtel, Adani Ports, Yes Bank, Dr Reddy's and HDFC Ltd, falling by up to 1.92 per cent.

Meanwhile, foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) sold shares worth a net of Rs 407.33 crore, while domestic institutional investors (DIIs) bought shares worth Rs 578.38 crore on Tuesday, provisional data showed.

Globally, Hong Kong's Hang Seng index was down 1.62 per cent, while Japan's Nikkei shed 1.79 per cent in early trade on Wednesday. Shanghai Composite too was down by 2.04 per cent.

The US Dow Jones ended 1.58 per cent lower in Tuesday's trade.