Markets Witness Lacklustre Trade to Close in Red

 The markets closed in the red for the third consecutive day of the week as heavyweights RIL, SBI and ONGC winessed selling pressure through the day. The BSE benchmark index closed the day down 51 points at 18,086 and the Nifty shed 18 points to end at 5,420.The broader markets reacted even more sharply with the smallcap index closing at 8,189, down 0.8% and the midcap index shedding 0.6% to close at 6,762, both underperforming the Sensex down nearly 0.3% Earlier in the day, markets opened marginally higher tracking firm Asian cues, but immediately turned negative, few minutes after opening as investors turned jittery over earnings growth concerns. After that the markets turned choppy, dipping to the day's low of 18,021, down 157 points from the opening. Thereafter the markets retraced considerable ground from the lows of early noon. Among the sectoral indices, IT space saw some renewed buying interest and was the top gainer along with FMCG, both up 0.2% each. All the other sectoral sectoral indices closed in the negative with Oil & Gas and PSu leading the losses, down nearly 2% each. The market breadth was very negative. Of the total 2911 stocks traded on the BSE, 1751 stocks declined while 1018 gained.