Bloodbath on D-street: Sensex tanks by over 1000 pts, Nifty down by over 300 pts

The market tanked substantially following the presentation of the Union Budget by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman for the year 2020-2021. At 3:14 pm on Saturday, the Sensex was down by over 1000 points at 39,728.49, while the Nifty was down by 366 points at 11,668.85.

While market Investors were hoping for big reforms from the budget, the government's plan for the upcoming fiscal has only focussed on incremental changes. Sensex was trading over 150 points higher ahead of the Budget presentation.

Presenting the Union Budget for 2020-21, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman pegged the fiscal deficit at 3.8 per cent in the current fiscal, compared to the earlier target of 3.3 per cent of GDP.

In her second Budget presentation, the finance minister said certain government securities will be open for foreign investors.

She said the government plans to increase investment limit for FPIs in corporate bonds from 9 per cent to 15 per cent. Top losers in the Sensex pack included L&T, Tata Steel, ONGC, PowerGrid, IndusInd Bank and SBI. However, HUL, Bajaj Finance, Nestle, TCS and UltraTech Cement were trading higher.

The forex market remained closed for the weekend.