Spooked by the US Federal Reserve's gloomy economic projections amid the COVID-19 pandemic, Indian bourses slipped in early trading on Thursday.
Sensex, the 30-share benchmark index of the Bombay Stock Exchange, fell 322 points in the opening session on Thursday to trade at 38,292.
Sensex closed on Wednesday at 38,614 points. Similarly, the broader national stock exchange’s Nifty lost 72 points to trade at 11,337. The Nifty closed on Wednesday at 11,408 points.
Stock markets fell in opening trading in response to the gloomy economic projections by the US Federal Reserve amid the ongoing pandemic. The minutes of the US Fed Reserve meeting held on 29 July, released on Wednesday, revealed that the coronavirus will weigh heavily on the economy.
“Ongoing public health crisis would weigh heavily on economic activity, employment, and inflation in the near term and was posing considerable risks to the economic outlook over the medium term", the US Fed observed.
Following this statement, Asian equity markets tumbled on Thursday. In India, banking regulator RBI (Reserve Bank of India) also maintained that economic growth will remain in the negative in the current financial year (April 220 – March 2021). It has expressed concerns about inflation as well.
