The stock markets on Tuesday continued to spiral downhill amid the continuing panic over the novel coronavirus pandemic, with both the Sensex and the Nifty 50 crashing 2.5%. The BSE Sensex closed the day 811 points lower at 30,579, while the National Stock Exchange Nifty 50 ended 230.35 points down, at 8,967.
The markets recorded positive gains in the first half of the session but eventually fell again under the fear of an impending recession because of COVID-19.
The biggest losers on the Sensex were ICICI Bank, IndusInd Bank, Bajaj Finance, Kotak Bank, HDFC, Infosys and the State Bank of India. Meanwhile, the stocks of Hindustan Unilever Limited, Hero MotoCorp, Asian Paints, PowerGrid and Maruti Suzuki gained the most on the Sensex.
Other Asian markets like bourses in Shanghai and Seoul were also in the red on Tuesday, while the Hong Kong Hang Seng turned positive.
The Indian rupee, which dropped to a record low of 74.50 against the dollar on Monday, appreciated to 74.20.
India recorded its third death from the global pandemic on Tuesday after a patient died in Maharashtra. India has declared a countrywide lockdown of schools, colleges, gyms and swimming pools. After a meeting of a Group of Ministers, the government advised that people avoid non-essential travel and employees of private companies work from home. These measures are an attempt to enforce distance between people, a proven way to slow pandemics.
The novel coronavirus has infected 175,536 people, and killed 7,007 worldwide, according to an estimate from John Hopkins University, which is tracking cases reported by the World Health Organization and additional sources. China has the highest number of fatalities at 3,213, followed by Italy with 2,158 deaths and almost 28,000 cases.
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