Indian shares slide for sixth consecutive day

India's main stock index fell for a sixth straight session on Monday, its longest stretch of losses in almost five years, weighed down by weak world markets and US credit-related worries.

Investors were also disappointed as September industrial output grew at a slower-than-expected 6.4 per cent from a year earlier, well below annual growth of 10.7 per cent in August and missing market forecasts of 9.9 per cent growth.

The 30-share BSE index ended down 0.9 per cent, or 170.33 points, at 18,737.27, with 18 of the components falling. It had dropped as much as 3.03 per cent in early deals.

It matched the longest falling streak since early March 2003, when it had fallen for six days in a row. The index had fallen 5.4 per cent last week and is 7.4 per cent off a lifetime high of 20,238.16 hit on October 30.




"One reason for this fall is the global markets and the other one is foreign fund flows - some selling, some slowdown that we have witnessed in the last one week," said Neeraj Dewan, director at Quantum Securities in New Delhi.

Technology stocks Infosys Technologies, Tata Consultancy, Wipro and Sat-yam Computer, and index heavyweight Reliance Industries, which together account for more than a quarter of the total weightage in the main index, led the drop.

Foreign inflows have slowed this month after the market regulator curbed the use of participatory notes used by unregistered foreigners to buy Indian shares, while the lingering credit worries in the US have also weighed.

Foreign fund flows

Data showed foreign portfolio investors have been sellers of around $300 million in the first six sessions in November, trimming their net purchase in 2007 to about $17 billion.

"All eyes will be now on the foreign fund flows. If we see positive figures then a recovery is possible. But I think the pace at which they have invested in the last few months will slow down," Dewan said.

DD Sharma, vice-president at local brokerage Anand Rathi Securities, said fresh investment by the foreigners could only be expected in January next year.

"I don't think foreign investors are going to inject fresh funds at this fag end of the year. We will see fresh money only in January. So we are advising to book profit," he said.

In the broader market, 1,685 losers outpaced 987 gainers on volume of 387.1 million shares. The 50-share NSE index was down 0.81 per cent at 5,617.10.