Sensex, Nifty tank amid coronavirus case spike, partial lockdown; could another sell-off be on cards?

Fear of a bumpy economic recovery as Maharashtra starts its partial lockdown amid growing coronavirus cases pulled the indices lower on Monday. S&P BSE Sensex ended 870 points lower at 49,159 points while the benchmark 50-stock NSE Nifty closed at 14,637. Only IT stocks and Bharti Airtel closed with gains among Sensex constituents while banking and finance sectors stocks fared the worst. Volatility spiked to breach 23 levels during the day but cooled off before the closing bell to sit at 21.22.

Shrikant Chouhan, Executive Vice President (Equity Technical Research), Kotak Securities

“Breaking all the important support, the market went back to 14,450 levels and came back. For the last 20 days, 14,450 has been working on an important basis. From now on, 14,450 would act as a trend decider. However, the market may return to around 14,450 or 14,500 and the reason is that today’s fall was severe. The levels of 14,670 and 14,730 will be major obstacles and it is advisable to reduce weak long positions around the same. Trends above 14,900 can be subverted. Overall some days investors need to stay stock specific.”

Vinod Nair, Head of Research at Geojit Financial Services

“The market witnessed a huge sell-off today as India’s second wave of Covid-19 is getting bigger than anticipated and is expected to ruin the pace of economic recovery. High valuation added further concern due to a possible downgrade in Q1FY22 earnings. Barring IT, metal and telecom, all sectors remained in the red. A policy decision in the upcoming MPC announcement and Q4 earnings will define the market volatility in the coming days.”

Manish Hathiramani, proprietary index trader and technical analyst, Deen Dayal Investments

“We broke the level of 14500 on an intra-day basis but the Nifty was quick to recover from there and has closed above that support level. We are now in crucial territory. If we disrespect today’s low, we can fall further to 14250. On the upside, until we do not conquer 14950 we will not be in a bullish market and the index will continue to remain sideways with a bias on the downside.”

Rohit Singre, Senior Technical Analyst at LKP Securities

“Strong cuts have been witnessed in today’s session as nifty closed a day at 14,638 with loss of one & half per cent forming a bearish candle on the daily chart. The overall structure still looks of narrow consolidations as index rejected around 14,900 zone third time on hourly charts and we saw good profit booking from the same levels, now if index managed to sustain below 14,700 zone then we may see next move towards its previous swing low of 14,300 zone and if it managed to hold above 14,700 zone then some relief rally can be seen.”

Ajit Mishra, VP – Research, Religare Broking

“The week started on a negative note for the Indian markets mainly due to sharp surge in COVID-19 cases across the country. The sharp surge in COVID-19 cases has dented investor sentiments and has increased fear of harsh restrictions which would impact economic activity. Going forward, government actions to curb the surge would be one of the important factors to watch out for investors. Further, the upcoming RBI monetary policy would be actively tracked by investors. We expect the RBI to maintain its dovish stance and leave key rates to be unchanged.”