The Indian equity benchmarks edged lower for second straight session on Wednesday dragged down by losses in HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank, Tata Steel, Hindustan Unilever and Kotak Mahindra Bank.
The Sensex fell as much as 466 points and Nifty 50 index briefly dropped below 17,950.
However, the markets came off intraday low levels in afternoon trading on the back of buying interest in Reliance Industries, Bharti Airtel, Mahindra - Mahindra and ITC.The Sensex ended 81 points lower at 60,352 and Nifty 50 index fell 27 points to close at 18,017."Sustaining above 18,000 will be an important level for the Nifty to stay positive in the short term.
If the Nifty is able to sustain the level of 18,000, it can witness a positive momentum," said Vijay Dhanotiya, senior research analyst at CapitalVia Global Research.Eleven of 15 sector gauges compiled by the National Stock Exchange ended lower led by the Nifty PSU Bank index's over 2 per cent fall.
Nifty Metal, Realty, Private Bank, Media and Bank indices also fell between 0.7-1.8 per cent.On the other hand, Nifty Pharma, Healthcare, Oil - Gas and Auto indices ended higher.Mid- and small- cap shares also edged lower as Nifty Midcap 100 index declined 0.44 per cent and Nifty Smallcap 100 index ended on flat note with a negative bias.Shares of beauty start-up Nykaa made a blockbuster debut on Wednesday with its market capitalisation crossing Rs 1 lakh crore.
Shares of FSN E-Commerce Ventures, the company that owns the Nykaa brand, opened for trading at Rs 2,018 on the National Stock Exchange, up 79 per cent from its issue price of Rs 1,125 per share.
On the BSE, Nykaa shares opened for trading at Rs 2,001, up 78 per cent from the issue price.
Nykaa shares rose as much as 99 per cent to hit an intraday high of Rs 2,235 on the NSE.Hindalco was top Nifty loser, the stock fell 3.35 per cent to close at Rs 449.
IndusInd Bank, Tata Steel, JSW Steel, Coal India, SBI Life, Hindustan Unilever, Divi's Labs, Asian Paints, Titan and HDFC Bank also fell between 1.3-3.3 per cent.On the flipside, UPL, Bharti Airtel, Mahindra - Mahindra, Britannia Industries, Reliance Industries, ITC, Grasim Industries and Sun Pharma were among the gainers.The overall market breadth was marginally positive as 1,720 shares ended higher while 1,587 closed lower on the BSE.