Q3 Earning Fears Hit Bourses

Mumbai: Equity benchmark indices Sensex and Nifty tumbled nearly one per cent on Thursday due to heavy selling in market heavyweights HDFC Bank, TCS and Reliance as investors turned nervous over earnings growth concerns amid unabated foreign capital outflows. Besides, abys-mally low Chinese inflation data, an indication of poor demand, and a sell-off in US bonds add-ed to the pressure, traders said.

Sliding for the second straight day, the 30-share benchmark dropped 528.28 points or 0.68 per cent to sink below the 78,000 level at 77,620.21. During the day, it tanked 605.57 points or 0.77 per cent to 77,542.92. The NSE Nifty slumped 162.45 points or 0.69 per cent to 23,526.50.

Vinod Nair, head (research), Geojit Financial Services, said: “The Indian stock market mirrored the decline across its Asian peers, with cautious investor sentiment driven by a sell-off in US bonds. The US 10-year Treasury yield surged to its highest level since April 2024, signaling the expectation of fewer rate cuts by the Fed. Further, disappointing inflation data from China add-ed pressure, indicating that recent stimulus measures have failed to rejuvenate one of the world’s largest consumer markets.”

The BSE smallcap gauge tanked 1.17 per cent while the midcap index declined 0.96 per cent.

From the 30-share Sensex blue-chip pack, Tata Steel, Zomato, Larsen & Toubro, Tata Motors, Adani Ports, Tata Consultancy Services, HDFC Bank and NTPC were the major laggards. Nes-tle, Hindustan Unilever, Mahindra & Mahindra, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Asian Paints and Bharti Airtel were among the gainers. Meanwhile, India’s largest IT services company TCS reported an 11.95 per cent jump in net profit to Rs12,380 crore for the December quarter. The financial re-sults were announced after market hours.

Among BSE sectoral indices, realty slumped 2.90 per cent, oil & gas (2.19 per cent), energy (1.83 per cent), power (1.68 per cent), capital goods (1.54 per cent) and BSE Focused IT (1.14 per cent).