Rupee breaches 64-mark

Recovers to 63.25 on RBI intervention

Rupee touched the day’s high of 63.15, before settling at a closing low of 63.25, a fall of 12 paise over Monday’s close. File Photo: Nagara Gopal

Benchmark indices and the rupee on Tuesday recovered from low levels following intervention of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), which reportedly sold dollars to provide support to the slumping rupee. The RBI also, to attract remittances from non-resident Indians (NRIs), simplified rules for NRIs to invest in shares or debentures of local companies.

In early trade, the rupee slipped to a new low of 64.13 to a dollar as compared to Monday’s intra-day low of 63.30 following demand for dollars but it recovered sharply during the day after RBI sold dollars to take the pressure off from the currency, said market analysts. They said RBI was seen selling dollars at 63.85 level.

The rupee finally closed with a loss of 12 paise at 63.25 a dollar, down 12 paise from Monday’s close of 63.13.

Sensex trims loss

The S&P BSE Sensex opened sharply low at 18142.83 as compared to the overnight close of 18307.52 and soon plunged below the 18000-level to hit the day’s low of 17970.98, a fall of 337 points from the overnight close. But with buying at lower levels, the Sensex recovered to close at 18246.04, down 61.48 points, the lowest level in nearly a year.

The NSE Nifty too closed with a loss of 13.30 points at 5401.45, the lowest level in nearly a year. The Nifty had also recovered sharply during the day as it had plunged 52 points in early trade.

Consumer durable, automobile, healthcare and IT stocks suffered losses as reflected in the BSE sectoral indices. The consumer durable index was down 3.54 per cent, auto index 2.26 per cent, healthcare index 1.59 per cent and BSE IT index 1.40 per cent.

The top five Sensex losers included Tata Motors (down 4.66 per cent), Sun Pharma (down 2.42 per cent), TCS (down 2.39 per cent), M&M (down 2.38 per cent) and ONGC (down 1.95 per cent). Among the gainers, Sterlite was up 9.91 per cent and Tata Steel closed with a gain of 4.09 per cent.

The top five losers in Nifty included Tata Motors (5.04 per cent), ACC (4.38 per cent), HCL Tech (4.02 per cent), BHEL (2.76 per cent) and Sun Pharma (2.52 per cent).