Markets flat as Sensex closes in red

Markets are flat as the Sensex ends the day down at 60,106 and the Nifty drops to 17,896.

The Sensex pack contains:

Bharti Airtel, Hindustan Unilever, Titan, Reliance Industries, Nestle, IndusInd Bank, Bajaj Finserv, and NTPC were all part of the Sensex pack.

Equity benchmarks closed on a flat note on Wednesday in a highly turbulent market due to ongoing foreign capital outflows and a declining trend in index heavyweight Reliance Industries.

The 30-share BSE Sensex continued its downward trend from the previous day, dropping 9.98 points, or 0.02 percent, to conclude at 60,105.50.

It dropped 309.7 points, or 0.51 percent, over the day to reach 59,805.78.

The larger NSE Nifty ended at 17,895.70 after losing 18.45 points, or 0.10 percent.

The top laggards from the Sensex pack included Bharti Airtel, Hindustan Unilever, Titan, Reliance Industries, Nestle, IndusInd Bank, Bajaj Finserv, and NTPC.

Among the prizewinners were Sun Pharma, UltraTech Cement, Tata Motors, Larsen & Toubro, Tata Consultancy Services, HDFC Bank, and Tata Motors.

According to V K Vijayakumar, Chief Investment Strategist at Geojit Financial Services, "the largest drag on the market in the near-term is the continuous selling by FIIs for 13 straight sessions, which has brought the cumulative cash market selling to 16,587 crore."

According to exchange statistics, foreign institutional investors (FIIs) sold shares worth Rs 2,109.34 crore on Tuesday.

Shanghai's stock market closed lower, while equity markets in Seoul, Tokyo, and Hong Kong finished higher.

In mid-session trades, European stocks were trading in the green. On Tuesday, markets in the US finished in the green.

Brent crude, the global oil standard, increased 0.65% to $80.62 per barrel.