Market sees sharp fall; SENSEX declines 700 points, NIFTY tests 24,000 level

After opening positive, the Indian stock market on Friday, April 25, pared all gains and slipped in red amid geopolitical concerns.

At 10:05 AM, the S&P BSE SENSEX was down 564.10 points, or 0.71%, at the 79,237.33 level, while NSE’s NIFTY50 was at the 23,986.05 level, falling 260.65 points, or 1.07%.

The breadth remained in favour of declines as 2,055 stocks slipped in trade during the early session out of 2,478 traded.

The broader market also remained under pressure for the second consecutive day as both Nifty Midcap100 and Smallcap 100 declined 0.39% and 0.71%, respectively.

Among the Nifty PSU bank sectors, private banks, pharma, and media were the biggest losers, while Nifty auto, realty, and metal were the only gainers.  

Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) bought equities worth ₹8,250.53 crore on a net basis on Thursday, according to exchange data.

Globally, the US stocks ended higher on Thursday, rallying for a third straight day as investors watched for signs of progress in the US-China tariff war.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 486.83 points, or 1.23%, to 40,093.40, the S&P 500 was up 108.91 points, or 2.03%, to 5,484.77, and the Nasdaq Composite rose 457.99 points, or 2.74%, to 17,166.04.

Following this, the Asian markets headed for a second straight week of gains on Friday as all the indices were trading higher.

During the morning trade, the Asian markets remained positive. Japan's Nikkei 225 rose 1.92% to 35,713.35, while Singapore's Straits Times gained 0.14% to 3,837.25. Hong Kong's Hang Seng and South Korea's KOSPI advanced 1.31% and 0.15%, respectively.

As many as 2,478 stocks traded on the NSE during the early session, among which 2,055 stocks were trading in the red, only 375 advanced and 51 shares remained unchanged.

This indicated that the market breadth was in favour of negative.

Meanwhile, 25 stocks hit their one-year highs in the early trade, while only 5 stocks touched their 52-week lows.

Further, 46 stocks hit their upper circuits while 27 hit their lower circuits.

India VIX, the volatility gauge, was trading 1.10% higher at 16.43 levels.

SBI Life Insurance was the top gainer on the NIFTY50 index, followed by Reliance Industries, HDFC Life Insurance, Tata Consultancy Services and Infosys, rising as much as 4.92%.

Axis Bank, Adani Ports, Tech Mahindra, Bharat Electronics and Nestle India were the biggest losing stocks, falling as much as 3.62% on the 50-share index.

The company on Thursday reported a marginal increase in profit after tax (PAT) to ₹813.5 crore for the three months ending March 2025.

The insurer had posted a PAT of ₹811 crore in the same quarter of the preceding fiscal year.

Total income during the January-March period declined to ₹24,169 crore from ₹37,567 crore logged in the year-ago financial year (FY24).

On the National Stock Exchange, Mphasis shares rose as much as 3.23% to hit an intraday high of ₹2,547.80.

According to experts, the oil-to-telecom conglomerate is expected to report low single-digit growth in net profit and revenue.