By Aditya Raghunath
Investing.com -- Nifty and the BSE Sensex witnessed a massive sell-off as the number of COVID cases in the country continued to rise at record levels. India recorded over 1.7 lakh cases on Sunday.
Nifty closed down 3.53% at 14,310, just 10 points shy of breaking the 14,300 resistance level. If the market breaks this level in the coming trading sessions, the next resistance level is at 13,900. The Sensex closed down 3.44% or 1,708 points at 47,883. The two major fallouts that caused markets to crash today are:
- Fears of renewed lockdown: Maharashtra, India’s richest state and home of financial capital Mumbai, has been talking about a complete lockdown again. There are fears that other states might also follow suit. Clearly, the sell-off in the markets indicates that the impact of the second wave could be greater than the first one. As more businesses get locked down, sentiment will only get worse. Auto, banks, and tourism and hospitality stocks were hit the worst today.
- Weak rupee: The rupee fell to Rs 75.15 against the dollar today, the lowest it has been since July 2020. A weak rupee signals heavy selling by FIIs (foreign institutional investors) and higher inflation. FIIs have been net sellers in April so far as fears of COVID continue to rise.
Top losers on Nifty today were Tata Motors Ltd (NS:TAMO) (down 9.65%), Adani Ports and Special Economic Zone Ltd Future (down 8.94%), IndusInd Bank Ltd. (NS:INBK) (down 8.57%) and Bajaj Finance Ltd (NS:BJFN) (down 7.25%). Nifty Bank fell 5.1% today while the Nifty Auto index fell 5.11%.