New Delhi: Investors' wealth eroded sharply by Rs 20.16 lakh crore on Monday morning as the benchmark indices faced heavy drubbing, with the Sensex dropping over 5 percent, amid a global market meltdown due to growing trade war concerns.
The 30-share BSE benchmark tumbled 3,939.68 points or 5.22 percent to 71,425.01 in early trade.
Mirroring the bearish trend in equities, the market capitalisation of BSE-listed firms declined sharply by Rs 20,16,293.53 crore to Rs 3,83,18,592.93 crore (USD 4.50 trillion) during the morning trade.
All the Sensex firms were trading lower. Tata Steel and Tata Motors dropped over 10 percent each. Larsen & Toubro, HCL Technologies, Adani Ports, Tech Mahindra, Infosys, Tata Consultancy Services, Reliance Industries and Mahindra & Mahindra were the other big laggards.
In Asian markets, Hong Kong's Hang Seng index tanked more than 11 percent, Tokyo's Nikkei 225 plunged 7 percent, Shanghai SSE Composite index dropped nearly 7 percent and South Korea's Kospi sank over 5 percent.
US markets ended significantly lower on Friday. The S&P 500 tanked 5.97 percent, Nasdaq composite slumped 5.82 percent, and the Dow tumbled 5.50 percent on Friday.
"Globally markets are going through heightened volatility caused by extreme uncertainty. No one has a clue about how this turbulence caused by Trump's tariffs will evolve. Wait and watch would be the best strategy in this turbulent phase of the market," V K Vijayakumar, Chief Investment Strategist, Geojit Financial Services, said.
Global oil benchmark Brent crude dropped 2.76 percent to USD 63.77 a barrel.
The BSE smallcap gauge cracked 6.62 percent, and the midcap index tanked 5.01 percent.
All the BSE sectoral indices were trading in negative territory. Metal tumbled nearly 8 percent, industrials dropped 6.39 percent, commodities (6.14 percent), IT (5.71 percent), BSE Focused IT (5.57 percent), consumer discretionary (5.42 percent) and teck (4.84 percent).
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