Thursday, July 6 2006 18:11 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Mumbai: The Government's decision to keep all disinvestments proposals on hold was received with a cautious approach in the stock markets today (July 6, 2006) as the benchmark Sensex closed more than 150 points in the red.

After the overnight 256-point rally, the markets beat a hasty retreat, falling sharply by 152 points to end at 10,767.97.

The dramatic reversal in the trend was largely attributed to fears of slow reforms induced by the government's decision to keep all disinvestment proposals in abeyance following concerns voiced by some constituents of the ruling UPA alliance.

The brokers said domestic mutual funds seemed to be heavy sellers at the current levels amid a slowdown in FII inflows.

The Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) 30-share sensitive index (Sensex) opened sharply lower at 10,836.49 and later moved downwards to the intra-day low of 10,703.00 before ending the day at 10,767.97 against previous close of 10,919.64.

The National Stock Exchange's (NSE) S&P CNX Nifty also fell by 40.70 points or 1.27 per cent to 3,156.40 from previous close of 3,197.10.

However, a mixed trend was witnessed in the Asian markets where Japan's Nikkei ended down by 202.54 points and the Kospi lost by 15.89 points. Hong Kong's Hang Seng added 173.81 points.

Bank shares were the worst hit in the domestic market due to heavy selling pressure seen on the sector counters.

ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank, SBI, Tata Steel, Satyam Computers, RIL, Infosys Technologies, L&T, BHEL, Dr Reddy's Lab, ITC, TCS Ltd and Grasim were among the major losers.