The BSE benchmark Sensex today fell over 225 points to plunge below the 19,000 mark in early trade led by over six per cent drop in Sun Pharma,after the pharmaceutical major and Israel's Teva agreed to pay USD 2.15 billion patent infringement settlement to Pfizer and Takeda. Falling for the third straight session,the 30-share barometer fell further by 225.56 points,or 1.18 per cent,to 18,815.57 with all the sectoral indices,led by healthcare and auto,fell up to 1.79 per cent. The index had lost nearly 400 points in the previous two sessions. Similarly,the wide-based National Stock Exchange index Nifty slipped below 5,700 points mark trade 60.25 points,or 1.05 per cent lower at 5,699.95. Shares of Sun Pharma fell as much as 6.14 per cent to Rs 918.05 apiece after the company along with Israel's Teva agreed to pay USD 2.15 billion patent infringement settlement to Pfizer and Takeda for acid reflux medicine Protonix in the US. Brokers said massive foreign fund outflows due to weak factory output and sticky inflation also put pressure on local equities and even global rating agency Fitch revising India's sovereign credit outlook to stable from negative could not boost the trading sentiment. A weak trend in the Asian region following overnight losses at the US market also hit the trading sentiment here,they added. FIIs pulled out a whopping Rs 1,060.17 crore from local stocks yesterday,according to BSE provisional data. The Japan's Nikkei fell by 4.67 per cent,while Hong Kong's Hang Seng shed 2.61 per cent in early trade. The US Dow Jones Industrial Average ended 0.84 per cent lower in yesterday's trade.
