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NEW DELHI: A day after making a comeback, Indian equity indices resumed their downward trend on Thursday on unabated fall in the Indian rupee and negative Asian cues.
Gains in IT, pharma and auto stocks were outpaced by losses in banks.
Domestic equity benchmarks followed a weak trend in global markets as a political crisis in Turkey and US-China trade war woes weighed on investor sentiment.
The rupee's pain was far from getting over.
The domestic unit on Thursday opened at a fresh record low of 70.19 against the US dollar.
However, it plunged further and was trading at 70.39 per dollar.
At the time of writing this report, the rupee was trading 39 paise down at 70.29.
However, as per media reports, emerging market currencies improved a little after Turkey's lira recovered further.
A slight fall in the US dollar and a little better lira along with firming Chinese yuan came as a welcome relief for emerging market currencies.
Global markets moved slightly up as trade war worries ebbed after China showed its intent for talks with the US later this month.
But the development failed to lift the market mood.
The Sensex shed 188 points, or 0.50 per cent, settling at 37,664, with 13 stocks advancing and 18 declining.
The Nifty50 fell for 50 points, or 0.44 per cent, ending the day at 11,385, with 20 stocks in the green and 30 in the red.
Broader midcap and smallcap indices remained mostly in line with Sensex, falling up to 0.48 per cent.
HDFC twins, Kotak Mahindra Bank and Reliance Industries stood among the top drag on the Sensex index.
Infosys, however, along with Sun Pharma, ICICI Bank and Axis Bank upheld.
Reliance Industries closed nearly 1 per cent down on Thursday after a temporary shutdown of its Jamnagar unit.
The oil-to-telecom behemoth on Wednesday informed bourses that the company has taken short shutdown of one of the Fluid Catalytic Cracking Units (FCCU) at Jamnagar complex to ensure reliability and integrity of operations.
Sun Pharmaceutical advanced 3 per cent on Thursday as the pharma major got a go-ahead from the US Food and Drug Administration (USFDA) for its ophthalmic drug.
The drug maker on Tuesday reported a consolidated net profit of Rs 982.51 crore for the June quarter.
It had registered a net loss of Rs 424.92 crore in the year-ago quarter.
Most sectoral indices settled in the red today.
However, pharma, IT, utilities, auto and teck closed the day with mild gains.
