Key indices fall for third day; Sensex loses 18 points, Nifty down 17 points

Mumbai (Maharashtra) [India], February 21 (ANI): The domestic equity markets on Tuesday continued with losses amid weak cues from global stocks. Indices of BSE IT, BSE Realty and BSE Financial Services also settled in the negative territory on Tuesday.
Investors preferred to stay cautious ahead of the release of minutes of the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting. Traders are keenly eyeing the US Fed meeting minutes, scheduled to release tomorrow, for hints on further monetary policy tightening.
The S&P BSE Sensex declined 18.82 points or 0.03 per cent to 60,672.72. The Nifty 50 index shed 17.90 points or 0.10 per cent to 17,826.70. In three consecutive sessions, the Sensex lost 1.05 per cent while the Nifty fell 1.16 per cent.
In Asian markets, Japan's Nikkei lost 58 points, S&P ASX went down 8 points, China's Hang Seng declined 357 points and China's Shanghai gained 16 points.
In American markets, Dow Jones gained 129 points, Nasdaq, NYSE, S&P 500 were trading in the positive territory.
In European markets, CAC 40 was down 25 points, Amsterdam Exchange lost 5 points, Deutsche Borse declined 61 points, FTSE 100 lost 26 points.
The top gainers on the Sensex were NTPC, Tata Steel, Power Grid, Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) and HDFC while Tata Motors, Sun Pharma, Wipro, TCS and UltraTech Cement were the top losers.
TCS, Infosys, Reliance Industries, L&T and Tata Steel are among the volume toppers on the BSE Sensex-30 index.
On the NSE Nifty index, the top winners are NTPC, Tata Steel, Adani Ports, Power Grid, Britannia Industries, with NTPC up 2.83 per cent. The biggest laggards are Apollo Hospitals, Bajaj Auto, Adani Enterprises, IndusInd Bank, Coal India, with Apollo Hospitals down 2.04 per cent. (ANI)