In South Korea shares also shed 2.71% to 1,376.15. Australian index S&P/ASX 200 index fell 2.3% on heavy volume to close at a seven-week low of 5,642.40. The index is down 6.6% from the last month record high of 6,052.1. BHP Billiton led the decliners, with commodity-price weakness giving an added reason to sell resources. BHP shed 2.9%, Rio Tinto lost 2.5% and Woodside Petroleum closed down 4.2%.

Other major markets also declined. Singapore Straits Times Index finished 3.1% lower, at 2,982.29, the Weighted Price Index of the Taiwan Stock Exchange closed 3.7% lower to 7,344.56 and the Kuala Lumpur Composite Index, ended down 4.6%, at 1,110.69.


8:00AM NY-7:00PM Mumbai Sensex plummets following global sell-off.
The Sensex on BSE finished 471.09, or 3.66%, lower at 12,415.04. The market-breadth was appalling as there were more than ten decliners for every advancer. For 2,363 stocks that declined, only 220 advanced and 28 were unchanged. Of the 30 stocks in the Sensex, only two advanced, while the rest declined. On NSE, the turnover was Rs 8,550.91 crore, lower than Rs 8,960.58.

Economic news

The rupee declined the most in almost four months as a collapse in global stocks extended to a second week, raising speculation that foreign funds will sell riskier assets including emerging-market shares. The rupee fell 0.6% to Rs 44.5725 against the dollar, the biggest drop since November 13.

Overnight cash rates plunged to 18-month lows on Monday and bond yields advanced after the RBI limited the amount of cash it would absorb in daily market operations and added it would issue market stabilization bonds. From Monday, RBI will absorb a maximum of Rs 30 billion, or $675 million per day at its reverse repurchase auction window.

Trading highlights

Reliance Industries was the most-active stock with a turnover of Rs 234.80 crore followed by Reliance Communications and Apollo Hospitals.

Advancers

Gujarat Ambuja Cements and Grasim Industries were the only two large-cap advancers. Gujarat Ambuja finished 2% higher at Rs 111.9, while Grasim edged 0.2% higher at Rs 2,102.1.

Decliners

Pharmaceutical large-cap Ranbaxy laboratories led the decliners, down 7.6% to Rs 321.1, while cap maker Maruti Udyog declined 6.6% to Rs 779.3, having dipped to a low of Rs 781 earlier.

Other prominent decliners included Dr Reddy’s, down 6.4% to Rs 618.7, Tata Steel declining 5.1% to Rs 420.3, Wipro off 6.3% to Rs 537.2 and L&T shedding 5.5% to Rs 1,383.8.

Index heavy Reliance Industries declined 5.03% to Rs 1,251.15 on a huge 18.50 lakh shares traded on BSE. R Systems International plummeted 17.93% to Rs 133, after the company posted a poor fiscal performance for Q4 ended December 31 2006. Shares of Infosys dropped 4.6% to Rs 2,006.6 and Tata Consultancy slipped 3.8% to Rs 1,162.20.


7:00AM European markets declined Monday on global market weakness.
European markets were sharply lower on Monday. The German DAX Xetra 30 dropped 2% to 6,472.81, the French CAC 40 fell 1.8% to 5,328.70 and the U.K. FTSE 100 lost 1.4% to 6,031.40.

Advancers

One of the few advancers was HSBC Holdings edging 0.2% higher after reporting a 5% profit rise in 2006 and lifting its dividend by 11%. It took $10.57 billion in charges, mostly on a poor performance out of the U.S.

Countrywide gained 3.5% after Apollo Management late Friday agreed to buy the real estate chain shares for 1 billion pounds. Getaz Romang shares rose 21% after Ireland CRH agreed to buy it for $442 million.