Mumbai: Banking stocks Thursday faced heavy selling pressure and fell by 1-3 percent on profit booking in a weak market.
The banking index settled nearly 2 percent down, with a heavy plunge in share prices of Punjab National Bank, Bank of Baroda and Canara Bank.
Other leading lenders like ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank and SBI also saw their stocks plummet during today's trading session.
Among bank scrips, Punjab National Bank tumbled the most 3.97 percent, followed by Bank of Baroda (down 3.29 percent), Canara Bank (2.57 percent) and IndusInd Bank (2.55 percent).
Shares of Axis Bank was down 2.50 percent, Yes Bank 2.40 percent and Bank of India fell by 2.15 percent on the BSE.
Led by losses in these stocks, the BSE banking index fell by 1.76 percent to end at 21,538.59 points.
Marketmen attributed the fall in the counter to profit booking and weak investor sentiments.
Meanwhile, Sensex today closed 152 points down on a late sell-off in bluechips. After the initial surge, the Sensex dropped afterwards on profit-booking to the day's low of 28,411.70 and finally ended at 28,469.67, a loss of 152.45 points or 0.53 percent.
