Market Close: Market takes a U turn

In the last half hour of trade on Thursday, the BSE Sensex slipped more than 300 points and Nifty followed with loss of 84 points. Mid-cap and small-cap stocks also lost steam after Wednesday's rally.

The BSE Sensex closed at 38,730.86, down by 323.82 points or 0.83 per cent. The index opened at 39,101.78 and hit an intraday high of 39,262.22 and an intraday low of 38,663.98. The much traded index Bank Nifty closed at 29,561.35, down close to 300 points or 299.45 points, down one per cent. Nifty50 closed at 11,641.80, down 84.35 points or 0.72 per cent. On a broader market basis, Nifty Mid-cap 100 was down by 0.39 per cent, while Nifty Small-cap 100 was marginally up by 0.02 per cent.

Index heavyweights, Reliance, HDFC, HDFC Banks, ICICI Bank, Infy contributed negative 49.06 points, 36.06 points, 35.03 points, 25.54 points and 19.43 points, respectively.

Among the top losers on Sensex were Sun Pharma, Tata Motors, SBI, Maruti, Vedanta and Tata Steel. While on Nifty among the top losers included Bharti Infratel and Hindalco.

Much of the index losses on Thursday were due to the simple fact that the stocks could not sustain the previous day's highs.