Sensex tumbles over 500 pts in early trade; Nifty slips below 9,200

Equity benchmark Sensex tumbled over 500 points in early tre on Friday dragged by losses in banking and IT stocks amid weak cues from global markets. After hitting a low of 31,278.27, 30-share index was tring 534.23 points or 1.68 per cent down at 31,328.85. Similarly, NSE Nifty declined 129.35 points, or 1.39 per cent, to 9,184.55.

Bajaj Finance was top laggard in Sensex pack, shedding up to 5 per cent, followed by ICICI Bank, IndusInd Bank, Axis Bank, HDFC twins, SBI, Infosys and TCS. On or hand, Hero MotoCorp, Sun Pharma, L&T, ONGC and HCL Tech were among gainers.

In previous session, BSE barometer surged 483.53 points or 1.54 per cent to close at 31,863.08, and broer Nifty vanced 126.60 points, or 1.38 per cent, to settle at 9,313.90. Foreign portfolio investors were net sellers in capital market on Thursday, as y offloed equity shares worth Rs 114.58 crore, according to provisional exchange data.

Domestic market opened on a negative te as global stocks slumped amid projections of severe coronavirus-led blow to global ecomy, trers said. Fitch Ratings has slashed India's ecomic growth projection to 0.8 per cent in current 2020-21 fiscal, saying an unparalleled global recession was underway due to COVID-19 crisis.

ncy has furr me large cuts to global GDP forecasts. Global ecomic growth is w expected to fall by 3.9 per cent in 2020, a recession of unprecedented depth in post-war period. This would be twice as severe as 2009 recession, it ted. Bourses in Shanghai, Hong Kong, Tokyo and Seoul were tring with losses in early deals.

On Wall Street, key indices closed in red in overnight session. Global oil benchmark Brent crude futures vanced 5.91 per cent to USD 22.59 per barrel. Furr, reports on Thursday said a potential antiviral drug flopped in a clinical trial, citing documents published accidentally by World Health Organisation. In India, death toll due to COVID-19 pandemic rose to 718, while number of cases in country climbed to 23,077. Global tally of infections has crossed 27 lakh, with over 1.90 lakh deaths.