Bourses fall for 7th day to end marginally lower in a volatile session ahead of RBI rate decision

Mumbai: Benchmark stock indices Sensex and Nifty closed marginally lower in a volatile session on Monday, extending their downtrend to the seventh day mainly due to selling in banking shares and persistent foreign fund outflows ahead of the RBI’s interest rate decision later this week.

After gyrating between gains and losses in a restricted trade, the 30-share BSE Sensex declined 61.52 points or 0.08 per cent to settle at 80,364.94. During the day, it hit a high of 80,851.38 and a low of 80,248.84.

Falling for the seventh consecutive session, the 50-share NSE Nifty slipped 19.80 points or 0.08 per cent to 24,634.90. Nifty has dropped more than 3 per cent in the seven straight sessions due to selling by foreign investors.

Auto and FMCG shares retreated while realty, energy, and metal shares advanced.

Among Sensex firms, Maruti, Axis Bank, Larsen & Toubro, ICICI Bank, Bharti Airtel, Infosys, Adani Ports and Hindustan Unilever were the laggards.

However, Titan, State Bank of India, Eternal and Trent were among the major gainers.

The BSE midcap gauge went up by 0.34 per cent while smallcap index dipped 0.17 per cent.

Among sectoral indices, teck declined 0.33 per cent, industrials (0.32 per cent), IT (0.25 per cent), auto (0.12 per cent) and capital goods (0.09 per cent).

Oil & Gas jumped 1.96 per cent, energy (1.10 per cent), realty (0.97 per cent), power (0.46 per cent), services (0.41 per cent) and metal (0.39 per cent).

In seven trading days, he BSE bencmark has tanked 2,649.02 points or 3.19 per cent, and the Nifty dived 788.7 points or 3.10 per cent.

FIIs offloaded equities worth Rs 5,687.58 crore on Friday, while Domestic Institutional Investors (DIIs) bought stocks worth Rs 5,843.21 crore, according to exchange data.

Global oil benchmark Brent crude declined 1.25 per cent to $69.25 a barrel.