New Delhi, Aug 25: Terming as a "small blip" the stock market crash after the serial blasts in Mumbai, Finance Minister Jaswant Singh today said the fundamentals of the economy and the markets were strong. "It (the bomb blast) is a small blip in the market but the fundamentals of the economy are very strong and markets are strong," Singh told reporters, reacting to the tumbling of share prices pushing down the Sensex by almost 180 points in intra-day trade.
The market crash came at a time when the sentiments had just started showing bullishness in the last few weeks. After opening at 4,125 points, the Sensex peaked to 4,170 by noon, before plummeting to 3,944 after the blast at around 1300 hours due to panic selling.
However, fresh buying from institutional investors pushed up the market which finally closed at 4004. Bond market was also impacted with 10-year benchmark government paper shedding 40 paise to Rs 133.60 while the rupee depreciated by almost 10 paise to Rs 45.92 a dollar. Bureau Report