Down 12,700 pts (31%), sensex has worst quarter

MUMBAI: As the fears about the impact of the spread of Coronavirus weighed on investor sentiment globally, Dalal Street ended its worst quarter ever on a brighter note. On Tuesday, a strong rally in sensex heavyweight Reliance Industries, along with across the board short covering and index management by large funds on the last day of the financial year, helped the index close at 29,648, up 1,028 points on the day.Of the sensex’s 30 constituents, 26 ended higher while IndusInd Bank, of late being hammered due to asset quality concerns, led the slide with a 14.7% crash.
More on Covid-19
Coronavirus pandemic: Complete Coverage21-day lockdown: What will stay open and what won'tHow to quarantine yourself at homeTrust the newspaper for your daily verified news
The January-March quarter, that saw the sensex give up almost 12,700 points, or 31%—that too after reaching an all-time high at 42,274 on January 20—has been the worst in terms of points loss as well as percentage loss. Also investors wealth erosion of Rs 42.6 lakh crore with BSE’s market capitalisation now at Rs 112.6 lakh crore, was the sharpest, official data showed. Foreign investors too took out over Rs 48,000 crore during the quarter, again making the three-month period the worst ever. Mutual funds, however, have acted as the cushion in the face of strong FPI selling and have recorded a net buying figure of about Rs 37,500 crore.

According to a note by Shrikant Chouhan, EVP — Equity Technical Research, Kotak Securities, the day’s gains could be called the yearly and quarterly NAV management day for the market with several of the large-cap stocks closing at the day’s high. Technically, if the nifty falls below 8,350 level, it would retreat further to 8,250 or even up to 8,000 level, Chouhan said. “Global markets are doing better than expected but our markets are trading cautiously due to consistent selling from foreign institutions.”
In Tuesday’s session, it was RIL that rallied over 8% and contributed about a fifth of the sensex gains which came after the company late on Monday said that its board on April 2 would consider fund raising. The decision by the company comes in the backdrop of an expected delay in stake buy by global oil major Saudi Aramco in RIL’s refinery business, a deal to offload a stake in Jio, its telecom arm to social media giant Facebook also being pushed back due to the Covid-related uncertainties, which also had shaved off over 40% of its value in less than three months and oil prices crashing by about 60% in less than two months.
The other top sensex gainers in Tuesday’s session were ITC, ONGC and Tech Mahindra. Other than IndusInd Bank, the other index laggards were Maruti, Bajaj Finance and Titan, BSE data showed.