Key Points
- Sensex fell 1,092.06 points (1.44%) to close at 74,775.74; Nifty 50 dropped 359.40 points (1.50%) to 23,547.75
- Intraday, the Sensex hit a low of 74,589.11, and Nifty touched 23,484.75 before a partial recovery at close
- Investors lost approximately ₹6 trillion in a single session as BSE market cap fell from ₹471 trillion to ₹465 trillion
- Nifty Oil & Gas was the worst-hit sector, falling 2.47%, followed by Metal and Financial Services Ex-Bank at 2.02% each
- Nifty IT was the only major index to end in the green, gaining 0.60%
- Brent crude fell over 1.5% to below $88 per barrel; oil prices are down more than 17% over the past month
Indian equity markets ended the week on a deeply negative note, erasing early gains in dramatic fashion during the final stretch of Friday’s trading session. Both benchmark indices had opened in positive territory, but uncertainty surrounding the status of a potential US-Iran agreement kept markets range-bound for most of the day. A sharp and sudden wave of selling pressure in the final hours brought the session to a painful close.
The BSE Sensex ended the day down 1,092.06 points, or 1.44 percent, settling at 74,775.74. The NSE Nifty 50 lost 359.40 points, or 1.50 percent, closing at 23,547.75. At its intraday worst, the Sensex had plunged nearly 1,300 points, hitting a session low of 74,589.11, while the Nifty touched a low of 23,484.75 before recovering marginally into the close.
The Sensex had opened at 75,988.51, reaching a high of 76,220.02 before the selloff took hold. The Nifty opened at 23,902.15 and briefly touched 24,002.80 before reversing sharply.
Broader Market Also Hit
Selling pressure was not confined to the large-cap indices. The Nifty Midcap index fell 1.33 percent, while the Nifty Smallcap index declined 0.85 percent, indicating broad-based weakness across market segments.
Sectoral Performance: Oil, Metals, and Financials Lead Losses
The Nifty Oil & Gas index bore the brunt of the decline, falling 2.47 percent. The Nifty Metal and Nifty Financial Services Ex-Bank indices each dropped 2.02 percent. The Nifty Auto, FMCG, Pharma, Private Bank, Healthcare, and Consumer Durables indices all shed more than 1 percent.
The sole bright spot was the Nifty IT index, which bucked the trend to close 0.60 percent higher, supported by gains in technology heavyweights.
Top Gainers and Losers Within Nifty 50
Among individual stocks, Tech Mahindra, HCL Tech, Wipro, Nestle India, and L&T rose more than 1 percent each. On the losing side, PowerGrid, IndiGo, ONGC, Max Healthcare, Eicher Motors, and Tata Consumer registered the sharpest declines of the session.
₹6 Trillion Wiped Out in One Session
The scale of Friday’s damage to investor wealth was severe. The total market capitalization of BSE-listed companies fell from approximately ₹471 trillion in the previous session to around ₹465 trillion, representing a single-session erosion of roughly ₹6 trillion.
Eyes on the Strait of Hormuz
Market analysts pointed to the Strait of Hormuz and ongoing Middle East diplomatic developments as the primary drivers of sentiment. Brent crude oil fell more than 1.5 percent to drop below $88 per barrel, while domestic crude oil futures slipped below ₹8,400 per barrel.
One expert noted that while geopolitical tensions are expected to ease in the near term, markets remain cautious. Oil prices have now declined more than 17 percent over the course of the month, suggesting that the geopolitical risk premium built into crude valuations in recent months is unwinding rapidly. Until clearer signals emerge on the US-Iran diplomatic front, volatility is likely to persist.
