Sensex cracks below 29000 as panic, carnage continue

■ SC pulling up telcos, recession fears worsen sentiments

National Company Law Tribunal allowed 90 days' extension for the corporate insolvency resolution process of Jet Airways. Jet’s resolution professional had last week filed an application in the NCLT seeking 90 days' extension for the insolvency process of the grounded airline after it failed to attract any bidder. The committee of creditors had on February 18 set a new deadline of March 10 for submission of bids.

Global recession fears, fresh coronavirus cases and the Supreme Court coming hard on telecom companies led to more panic selling in the equity market on Wednesday. Benchmark indices Sensex and Nifty-50 sank another 5.5 per cent to fresh three-year lows, in line with the massive selling witnessed in the AsiaPacific and Europe regions.

Confirmed coronavirus cases in the country rose to 151, and as the disease was still in the second stage, the next two weeks were crucial in preventing it from spreading to the community level, medical experts said. Globally, the confirmed cases of coronavirus topped 2-lakh mark, with 1 lakh more cases added after March 6, in just 12 days.

The worst affected countries included China

(81,000), Italy (31,000) Iran

(16,000), Spain (11,000), Germany (9,000), South Korea (8,000) and US

(5,000).

The Supreme Court said that the self-assessment of adjusted gross revenue (AGR) dues was in violation of its October 24 order and that all dues must be paid.

After the apex court lashed telecom companies, there was massive selling in blue-chips, particularly banks having exposure to the telecom sector and the telecom stocks that may get hit by court's stance.

The Sensex closed 5.59 per cent, or 1,709.58 points, down at 28,869.51 while the

Nifty-50 fell 498.25 points, or 5.56 per cent, to 8,468.80.

Investors lost another Rs

5.98 lakh crore as BSE's market capitalisation fell to Rs 1,13,53,329.30 crore as against Rs 1,19,52,066.11 crore crore on Tuesday.

It was the worst day for index heavy weights, led by IndusInd Bank (-23.90 per cent), HDFC Bank (9.92 per cent), Kotak Mahindra Bank (-11.23 per cent), HDFC (-7.47 per cent), Bajaj Finance (-11.11 per cent) and Hero Motocorp (-7.86 per cent), on the BSE.

Reliance Industries also fell 3.97 per cent while ICICI Bank lost another

2.96 per cent after massive

8.92 per cent fall in the previous session.

Telecom stocks that fell sharply included Bharti Airtel (-6.14 per cent), Bharti Infratel (-22.62 per cent) and Vodafone Idea (34.85 per cent).

The only saving grace was big value buying seen in PSU stocks in late afternoon trade. The PSU stock that gained included ONGC (9.83 per cent), Punjab National Bank

(6.52 per cent) and Bank of India (2.37 per cent) while SBI closed flat at Rs 214.65, down just 0.12 per cent.

Arun Kumar, market strategist, Reliance Securities, said, "The Nifty

50 hit a new three-year low by surpassing last Friday's low of 8,556. Though, the index is highly oversold on near-term basis, market technical displays incremental pain. The next significant support falls around Nifty-50's historical support in the zone of

7,890 - 8,000." Analyst said volatility index India VIX, which hit

12 year high of 64.57 on Wednesday, was still indicating wild market movements in the near future and no predictable range for the benchmarks. S Ranganathan, head of research at LKP Securities, said, ''What we witnessed today in our markets was truly unnerving to every investor as our market cap to GDP virtually touched 2008 global financial crisis lows."