Sensex falls over 150 pts, Nifty slips below 10,300

Mumbai: The BSE Sensex fell over 150 points and the NSE Nifty dropped below the 10,300-level in early trade Monday on unabated foreign fund outflow amid weak Asian cues and the weakness in rupee.

Falling for the fourth straight session, the BSE 30-share barometer fell 169.20 points, or 0.53 per cent, to 34,207.79 after hitting a low of 34,106.24. 

The gauge had plunged by 2,149.15 points in the previous three sessions.

Sectoral indices, led by metal, realty, consumer durables, capital goods, healthcare, auto, FMCG, power and teck, were trading in the negative terrain, falling up to 3.38 per cent.

The NSE Nifty fell 88.85 points, or 0.86 per cent, to 10,227.60.

Top laggards include Vedanta, Tata Steel, Adani Ports, HDFC, Wipro, L&T, RIL, Bajaj Auto, ITC, Maruti Suzuki, HUL, Sun Pharma, ICICI Bank, TCS, Bharti Airtel, IndusInd Bank, M&M and Axis Bank, dropping by up to 6.58 per cent.

However, Yes Bank, Coal India, SBI, ONGC, PowerGrid and Kotak Bank were trading in the green on value buying.

Foreign funds sold shares worth a net of Rs 3,370.14 crore, while domestic institutional investors bought equities worth Rs 1,902.07 crore Friday, provisional data showed.

Foreign investors have pulled out over Rs 9,300 crore (USD 1.3 billion) from the Indian capital market in the last four trading sessions.

Brokers said besides unabated foreign fund outflows, losses at other Asian markets, led by China and Friday's losses in the US market, dampened trading sentiments here.

Hong Kong's Hang Seng fell 0.87 per cent, while Taiwan TSEC index shed 0.78 per cent in their late morning deals. Shanghai Composite Index fell 2.95 per cent. Japanese markets are closed Monday for a public holiday.

The US Dow Jones Industrial Average ended 0.68 per cent down on Friday.