Closing Bell: Sensex tanks by 949 points, Nifty ends below 17000

Domestic equities ended lower for the second consecutive day on Monday amid rising concern over the Omicron variant.

Indian equity markets were deep down in red on Monday as investor sentiment was dented by rising cases of the Omicron variant in the country. During today's trading session, the Sensex dropped over 1,000 points and the Nifty index briefly tumbled below its important psychological level of 16,900. India has so far reported 21 cases of Omicron variant, among which nine from Rajasthan, eight from Maharashtra, and two from Karnataka, and one each in Gujarat and Delhi.

At the closing bell on Monday, the Sensex was down 949.32 points or 1.65% at 56,747.14, and the Nifty was down 284.40 points or 1.65% at 16,912.30. On the market depth, around 1340 shares have advanced, 1948 shares declined, and 165 shares remain unchanged.

On a sectoral basis, IT index fell over 2%, while other sectors lost 1% each. The same story was replicated in the broader markets as the BSE midcap and smallcap indices fell over 1% each.

Selling pressure was so intense that all the stocks listed on the BSE Sensex ended in the red. The top losers among them were IndusInd Bank, Bharti Airtel, Bajaj Finserv, TCS and HCL Technologies.

In other trending news, the three-day monetary policy committee meeting of the Reserve Bank of India commenced on Monday. According to a Reuters poll of economists, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) will hold rates at its December meeting and hike its reverse repo rate early next year and increase repo rate the following quarter.

IndusInd Bank was the top loser as the stock fell by 3.7% to Rs 916. Bajaj Finserv, Bharti Airtel, Tata Consultancy Services, HCL Technologies, Tech Mahindra, Tata Motors, Wipro, Divi's Labs, Infosys and Grasim Industries also fell between 2-3.4%.