Mumbai: NSE benchmark Nifty Tuesday fell for the third straight session by losing 63.25 points amid intense selling led by banking, metal, auto, infra and realty counters to end below the crucial 8,500-level.
Opening positive on value-buying, the key index witnessed heavy selling as China central Bank unexpectedly allowed its currency to devalue by nearly 2 percent against the US dollar, staging a turmoil in Asian stocks.
Investors already distressed by deadlock on passage of key GST bill during the current session of Parliament took a further hit on Q1 earning results of key heavyweights such as Tata Steel, SBI and Sun Pharma, resulting in sustained selling pressure amid volatility, which took the index to day's low of 8,441.30.
The overall banking space witnessed heavy selling with PSU banks losing 3.73 percent, followed by bank index 1.37 percent, financials 1.30 percent, metal 3.53 percent, auto 1.44 percent, infra 1.18 percent, realty 1.14 percent, energy 0.73 percent and FMCG 0.61 percent.
While, both small-cap and mid-cap indices dropped by 1.39 percent and 1.53 percent, respectively.
However, IT segment was the sole gainer up by 1.19 percent in today's trade.
Elsewhere, European stocks were also trading lower on China's unexpected devaluation of the yuan.
The broader 50-share Nifty opened higher at 8,548.45 and traded between 8,556.25 and 8,441.30 before closing at 8,462.35, showing a fall of 63.25 points or 0.74 percent.
Stockwise, major losers were Tata Steel (5.49 percent), SBI (4.93 percent), Tata Motors (4.29 percent), Hindalco (4.22 percent), Coal India (3.74 percent), ICICI Bank (2.37 percent) and BPCL (2.27 percent).
While, notable gainers were Infosys (2.13 percent), Bosch (2.12 percent), Tech Mahindra (1.83 percent), Zee Entertainment (1.27 percent) and TCS (1.25 percent).
Turnover in the cash segment rose to Rs 17,477.70 crore compared with Rs 16,378.84 crore yesterday.
A total of 9,001.55 lakh shares changed hands in 82,85,982 trades and the total market capitalisation of NSE stood at Rs 1,01,68,252 crore.
