Over Rs 2,000 crore worth of FII fund outflows as well as negative global cues subdued India's key indices -- S&P BSE Sensex and NSE Nifty50 -- on Monday.
This was the fourth consecutive session of losses for the market.
The FIIs were net sellers on BSE, NSE and MSEI in the capital market segment on Monday. They net sold Rs 2,261.90 crore worth of equities.
Last Friday, they net sold Rs 2,529.96 crore worth of equities, while on Thursday, they had pumped-out Rs 1,242.10 crore. The market opened lower, but soon began to rise till afternoon session only to cede the gains later on during the day's trade.
Initially, the two indices opened gap down in line with other Asian markets. However, it later made a recovery only to cede its gains during the late trading session.
Besides, volumes on the NSE were below recent average.
Among sectoral indices, bank index was the sole gainer whereas power, oil & gas, metals and healthcare indices lost the most.
The Sensex closed at 57,683.59 points, down 0.26 per cent or 149.38 points, while Nifty ended at 17,206.65 points, down 0.40 per cent or 69.65 points, from their previous close.
"Nifty has formed lower tops, lower bottoms over the near term, though the day-on-day loss has not been large," said Deepak Jasani, Head of Retail Research, HDFC Securities.
"Advance decline ratio continues to be deeply negative, and 17,070-17,381 could be the band for the Nifty in the near term," he added.
According to Siddhartha Khemka, Head of Retail Research, Motilal Oswal Financial Services: "We don't expect the volatility to cool down until the geo-political issues are resolved. Further, issues like inflation, FII selling and upcoming Fed rate hike could add to the volatility in the near term."
Vinod Nair, Head of Research at Geojit Financial Services, said: "Domestic indices started weak taking cues from negative global peers, but in between recouped most of its losses on reports of likely meeting between (Joe) Biden and (Vladimir) Putin over the Ukraine issue.
"However, the market could not stretch the direction and turned negative as uncertainty in the global markets continued. Investors stood sidelined, impacting the volumes. The market is expected to be volatile due to the upcoming Fed meeting and state election results."
Source : IANS