Stock market today | Sensex, Nifty 50 fell over 1% each yesterday: 3 reasons. What to expect today

Stock market today: Sensex and Nifty fell over 1 per cent each on March 13. As many as 43 stocks ended in the red in Nifty 50 index and shares of Power Grid (down 7.07 per cent), Coal India (down 7 per cent) and Adani Enterprises (down 6.81 per cent) were the top losers of the day. Sensex, on the other hand, fell 1.6 per cent to hit its intraday low of 72,515.71 while mid and smallcap indices suffered massive losses. BSE Midcap index fell nearly 5 per cent and BSE Smallcap index fell over 5 per cent.

Read more: Sensex crash: Why are markets falling and how low will they go?

On the BSE, overall market capitalisation of firms listed dropped to ₹372.1 lakh crore from ₹385.6 lakh crore in the previous session- with investors losing ₹13.5 lakh crore in a single session. Over 250 stocks hit fresh 52-week lows in intraday trade on the BSE which included Hindustan Unilever, SBI Cards and Payment Services, Page Industries, UPL and Zee Entertainment.

Here are major reasons behind the across-the-board selloff:

1. Concerns over frothy markets

Sebi chairperson Madhabi Puri Buch gave a froth warning on smallcaps and midcaps and the market regulator asked mutual funds last month to put in place a system to protect interest of smallcap and midcap investors.

Madhabi Puri Buch said, “There are pockets of froth in the market. Some people call it a bubble, some may call it froth. It may not be appropriate to allow that froth to keep building.”

Read more: ICICI Pru MF halts fresh subscriptions via lumpsum mode in mid, smallcap schemes

2. Valuations “off the mark”

Sebi chief warned that valuation parameters are off the charts and not backed by fundamentals which may be leading to "irrational exuberance". Read more: Uday Kotak on Sebi chief's froth warning: ‘Not yet out of control’

3. The impact of domestic macro numbers

India's retail inflation for February did not show improvement and came near the previous month's level . India's consumer price index (CPI)- based inflation eased to a four-month low of 5.09 per cent in February.