Markets decline in early trade dragged by IT stocks, foreign fund outflows

Mumbai: Benchmark indices Sensex and Nifty dropped in early trade on Monday amid selling pressure in IT stocks and foreign fund outflows.

The 30-share BSE Sensex declined 232.93 points to 82,267.54 in early trade. The 50-share NSE Nifty dipped 71.4 points to 25,078.45.

From the Sensex firms, Bajaj Finance, Infosys, Tech Mahindra, Bharti Airtel, HCL Tech and Asian Paints were among the biggest laggards.

However, Trent, Axis Bank, Mahindra & Mahindra and NTPC were among the gainers.

Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) offloaded equities worth Rs 5,104.22 crore on Friday, according to exchange data.

"Nifty has been exhibiting weak trend weighed mainly by the weakness in the IT stocks. This weakness may persist particularly since the FIIs were big sellers in the cash market last Friday. Market is expecting a US-India trade deal soon with a tariff rate of around 20 per cent for India. If this happens the market will get a sentimental boost. Any disappointment on this front can drag the market further down," VK Vijayakumar, Chief Investment Strategist, Geojit Investments Limited, said.

In Asian markets, South Korea's Kospi, Shanghai's SSE Composite index and Hong Kong's Hang Seng were trading in the positive territory while Japan's Nikkei 225 index quoted lower.

The US markets ended lower on Friday.

Global oil benchmark Brent crude climbed 0.17 per cent to USD 70.48 a barrel.

On Friday, the Sensex tanked 689.81 points or 0.83 per cent to settle at 82,500.47. Similarly, the Nifty dropped 205.40 points or 0.81 per cent to 25,149.85.