An evening walk down Dalal Street

Looks like equities had a case of Monday blues as benchmarks ended the day on a lower note, courtesy a fall in banks as well as a weak rupee.

The Indian currency fell on the back of a sharp drop in Turkish lira against the US dollar. As a result, it had a negative impact on other emerging market currencies and that lead to a fall in the rupee as well on fears of a spill-over effect.

The Nifty managed to give up 11,400-mark, while the Sensex fell over half a percent.

The Indian currency on Monday touched an all-time low of 69.8550, following the fall in Turkish currency.

Following results of State Bank of India (SBI), banking stocks fell sharply on Monday, continuing its nervous momentum from Friday. The Bank Nifty ended over a percent lower, while the Nifty PSU bank index fell over 2.5 percent. What aided to the negative sentiment was a weak phase in midcaps too. The Nifty midcap index fell almost a percent. Among other losers were metals, auto and energy names.

The only sectors to shine during the day’s trade were the traditional defensives. Weak rupee ensured a good boost to information technology (IT) stocks, while pharmaceuticals too had a good day of trade, led by a surge in Sun Pharmaceuticals.

The day began on a negative note itself, with the Sensex falling around 250 points, while the Nifty, too, breached 11,350 as well. Selling in midcaps also weighed on indices. But during the afternoon, there was some recovery seen on the back of a pullback in midcaps. However, last hour selling in this segment again took a turn for the worse.

At the close of market hours, Sensex closed down 224.33 points or 0.59% at 37644.90, while the Nifty fell 73.70 points or 0.64% at 11355.80. The market breadth is negative as 963 shares advanced, against a decline of 1,716 shares, while 161 shares were unchanged.

Among stocks, Infosys, Sun Pharma, GAIL and Tech Mahindra were the top gainers, while Yes Bank, Vedanta, BPCL and HPCL lost the most among both indices.