Sensex, Nifty open lower as North Korea spooks markets yet again

Key indices on Monday opened flat over escalating global tensions after a fresh nuclear test by North Korea on Sunday.

Asian markets were under pressure as North Korea’s latest nuclear disrupted markets and forced investors to run towards safe haven assets.

On September 3, the US Geological Survey suggested that a 6.3-magnitude earthquake registered at North Korea’s Punggye-ri testing site. Experts believe that the earthquake indicated that Pyongyang detonated a hydrogen bomb with a 100-kiloton yield.

At home, Markets could see an impact over Cabinet reshuffle. POsitive sentiment is expected as Nirmala Sitharaman became India’s first full-time woman Defence Minister. Piyush Goyal, who took charge as India’s new Railway Minister, Petroleum Minister Dharmendra Pradhan and the Minority Affairs Minister Mukhtar Abbas Naqvi, have been also elevated to Cabinet rank.

The former Railway Minister, Suresh Prabhu has been now given charge of Commerce and Industry ministry.

However, in early trade, most sectoral indices were trading in red dragged by banking and financial indices except the auto and metal indices, that were trading in green on NSE.

At 9:17 am, the S&P BSE Sensex was trading at 31,839, down 53 points while the broader Nifty50 index was ruling at 9,968 down 6 points.

Major losers among Sensex components were Adani Ports, Dr Reddy's, Kotak Bank, Asian Paint, Sun Pharma, Infosys, HDFC Bank, Bharti Airtel, L&T, Hind Unilever, Hero MotoCorp, NTPC,HDFC Ltd, M&M and Tata Steel, losing by up to 1.88%. Among other Asian markets, Japan's Nikkei was down 0.86% while Hong Kong's Hang Seng fell 0.49 per cent inearly trade. Shanghai Composite Index, however, was marginallyup by 0.08 per cent. The US Dow Jones ended 0.18 per cent higher in Friday's trade.

Bombay Stock Exchange - BSE

National Stock Exchange of India Ltd (NSE)