On Thursday, Indian stock markets experienced a volatile session amid escalating India-Pakistan tensions, triggering panic selling by investors. The S&P BSE Sensex saw a sharp drop of over 700 points before recovering slightly to close at 80,334.81, while the NSE Nifty50 ended the day down 140.60 points, closing at 24,273.80.
According to Aditya Gaggar, Director of Progressive Shares, the market began on a lackluster note and remained range-bound for most of the day. However, news related to the rising India-Pakistan tensions spurred panic selling that led to the steep decline in the latter half of the session.
Despite the overall downturn, some stocks managed to close in the green. Kotak Mahindra Bank led the gainers with a 0.81% rise, followed by Axis Bank (up 0.70%), Titan Company (0.69%), HCLTech (0.67%), and Tata Motors (0.21%).
On the flip side, Eternal saw the worst performance, plunging by 3.14%, followed by Mahindra & Mahindra (M&M), which fell 2.85%, and Maruti Suzuki India, which declined 2.04%. Other major losers included Tata Steel and Bajaj Finance, which dropped 1.81% and 1.86%, respectively.
In terms of sectors, IT and Media managed to close in positive territory, while Realty and Metal stocks were the worst-hit. Midcap and Smallcap stocks were especially under pressure, both falling over 1%, and underperforming the benchmark indices.
Despite the sharp intraday decline, the Nifty50 continues to trade within its established range of 24,250-24,500, awaiting a breakout to indicate the next clear market direction.
