Sensex tanks over 540 points, banking stocks derail

New Delhi: Markets opened in the negative zone on Thursday led by losses in banking stocks.

The BSE Sensex tanked 544.57 points or 1.70 percent to 31,464.04 in early trade. On the othe hand, the NSE Nifty dropped 147.15 points or 1.57 percent to 9,236.40.

FM Nirmala Sitharaman announced the on the details of Rs 20 lakh crore Atmanirbhar Bharat scheme on Wednesday. The FM announced a slew of fiscal and regulatory measures for MSMEs, real estate, NBFCs, power distribution and general businesses.

Major losers were Infosys, Tech Mahindra, HDFC Bank, M&M, IndusInd Bank, Axis Bank, Powergrid, ICICI Bank, Maruti, HDFC, SBI and ONGC, falling upto 4.45 percent.

Major gainers in the Sensex pack were Bajaj Finance, Nestle, Sun Pharma, ITC and Bharti Airtel, rising upto 1.87 percent.

Among Asian peers MSCI`s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan fell 1%, while Japan`s Nikkei fell about 0.7%. U.S. stock futures fell 0.2%, after the S&P 500 index`s worst two-day drop in nearly a month. Benchmark indexes in Australia, Hong Kong , Korea  and China all fell about 1%, a Reuters report said.