Sensex drops over 100 pts in early trade; Nifty slips below 18,100

Mumbai, v 16 (PTI) Equity benchmark Sensex fell over 100 points in early trade on Tuesday tracking losses in index majors Reliance Industries, HDFC twins and Kotak Bank despite a largely positive trend in global markets.

30-share index was trading 122.35 points or 0.20 per cent lower at 60,596.36 in initial deals. Similarly, Nifty fell 45.45 points or 0.25 per cent to 18,064.

HDFC was top loser in Sensex pack, shedding over 1 per cent, followed by Kotak Bank, Asian Paints, Kotak Bank, Reliance Industries and PowerGrid.

On or hand, Tata Steel, M&M, Bajaj Finserv, Maruti, Nestle India and Tech Mahindra were among gainers.

In previous session, Sensex settled 32.02 points or 0.05 per cent higher at 60,718.71. Similarly, Nifty rose 6.70 points or 0.04 per cent to 18,109.45.

Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) were net buyers in capital market, as y purchased shares worth Rs 424.74 crore on Monday, as per exchange data.

"Market direction is likely to be influenced largely by global developments, particularly market's response to rising inflation.

"US and European markets shrugging off high US inflation rate of 6.2 per cent is very significant and this is likely to impart resilience to global equity markets in short-term even while re is concern about elevated valuations in stock prices," said VK Vijayakumar, Chief Investment Strategist at Geojit Financial Services.

Back home in India, RBI has again cautioned that stock prices in India are much higher judged by traditional parameters of valuation. But central bank is optimistic about growth recovery underway in Indian ecomy, he ted.

Elsewhere in Asia, bourses in Shanghai, Hong Kong, Tokyo and Seoul were trading with gains in mid-session deals.

Stock exchanges in US ended marginally lower in overnight session.

Meanwhile, international oil benchmark Brent crude rose 0.89 per cent to USD 82.78 per barrel. PTI ANS DRR DRR