Mumbai: The market has erased most of its new year gains on fears over a US Fed rate hike and the Covid third wave.The Sensex lost more than a per cent for the third consecutive session to close below the 60000-mark at 59464, down 634 points.
The Sensex has shed close to 2000 points from its January 17 peak of 61308.91. The Nifty-50 fell 181.40 points or 1.01 points to close at 17757.
Foreign portfolio investors have turned net sellers, and on Thursday offloaded shares worth Rs 4,679.884 crore, which led to panic in the market. The Sensex was down 1030 points intraday before a pull back.
The broader market resisted the sell off as the BSE Mid-Cap closed flat down 0.07 per cent and the Smallcap Index was up 0.05 per cent.
"Sentiments were driven negatively by the rising US Treasury yields that has soared to a two-year high of 1.90 per cent. On the backdrop remains the narrative of aggressive US Fed’s tightening of its monetary policy. The street fears the Federal Reserve will have to accelerate further its tightening pace," said Prashant Tapse, vice president-research, Mehta Equities.
"Rising bond yields are pressuring foreign investors to pull out funds from highly valued markets like India,” said Vinod Nair, head of research, Geojit Financial Services.
