Sensex down more than 500 points led by banks

New Delhi, Jan 23 (IANS) BSE Sensex has now slumped more than 500 points on Tuesday with banks leading the fall.

BSE Sensex is trading at 70,855.44 points, down 568.21 points or 0.80 per cent.

Indusind Bank, HDFC Bank are down 3 per cent. Consumer stocks, Hindustan Unilever and Asian Paints are down more than 2 per cent.

Among the broader markets, Railway stocks are down sharply. Railtel is down 13 per cent, Ircon is down 12 per cent, Texmaco Rail is down 10 per cent, RVNL is down 9 per cent, IRFC is down 9 per cent, RITES is down 8 per cent, Titagarh is down 7 per cent.

Zee Entertainment shares are down a massive 26 per cent on Tuesday.

Zee is trading at Rs 170, down 26.6 per cent. The lower circuit is at 30 per cent.

After more than two years of deliberation, Sony has terminated its merger cooperation agreement (MCA) with Zee and sought a termination fee of USD90m from the company for an alleged breach of the MCA.

Zee has said that it would evaluate all its options, including a legal action. Surprisingly, it has mentioned that Punit Goenka, Zee’s MD and CEO, had agreed to step down, a key bone of contention between the two parties. "As a result, we downgrade our rating on the stock to Neutral," Motilal Oswal Financial Services said.

The company’s performance has been abysmal for the last four years as ad revenue declined 14 per cent over FY20-23 due to weak market conditions and continued market share loss over the last 4-5 years, from over 20 per cent to sub-17-18 per cent. At a time when the industry is seeing a shift toward OTT, Zee5 individually would be on a weak footing, playing the second fiddle in a market dominated by strong players like Disney, Netflix, Amazon Prime, and Reliance Industries-led Network18. This is unlike the linear TV market, in which it has maintained its position among the top two players for a prolonged period, the report said.