The NSE Nifty fell 0.8%, or 203.75 points, to finish at 24,609.70. The BSE Sensex moved 0.8%, or 644.64 points, lower at 80,951.99. Both indices dropped as much as 1.4% earlier in the day
Elsewhere in Asia, South Korea and Hong Kong fell 1.2% each. Japan declined 0.8% while Taiwan and China declined 0.6% and 0.2%, respectively. Indonesia ended 0.3% higher.
On Wednesday, yields on the 30-year US Treasury – a proxy for the US government’s long-term borrowing costs – surged to an 18-month high of 5.08% as bonds prices were under pressure in the wake of the economy’s rising debt burden. The muted treasury bond auction and the downgrade of the US credit rating from AAA to AA1 amplified the recent bond sell-off.
“The decline in the market today can be attributed to the sell-off in the US and Japanese bond markets, which led to jitters in US equities,” said Akshay Chinchalkar, head of research, Axis Securities. Foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) sold shares worth a net Rs 5,045 crore on Thursday. In May, overseas investors bought Rs 10,794.6 crore. Their domestic counterparts bought shares worth Rs 3,715 crore. Both indices declined around 1.5% each in the past five trading sessions. Notwithstanding the recent weakness, technical indicators are still not flashing bearishness. “The broader market has not seen a major correction and the buying interest in stocks indicate that today’s fall was a correction in an uptrend,” said Ruchit Jain,vice president — head of technical research, Motilal Oswal Financial Services.
Chinchalkar said the Nifty is trading above its 200-day moving average of 24,164, which implies it’s a ‘buy on dips’ market for now.
“If investors anticipated a further decline from here, then the volatility gauge would have shot up, but on the contrary, the India VIX fell today, indicating that a deeper decline is not currently priced in,” he said.
The Volatility Index or VIX — the market’s fear gauge — fell 1.7% to 17.26 on Thursday, indicating traders expect lower risks in the near term. The Nifty Mid-cap 150 index declined 0.4% while the smallcap 250 index ended flat. Out of the 4,086 shares traded on BSE, 1,661 advanced, while 2,275 declined.
