The benchmark indices failed to hold on to opening gains and ended lower for the fourth straight day on Thursday in a highly volatile session.

Sensex closed with a loss of 455 points, or 0.62%, at 72,488.99 while the Nifty 50 ended the day at 21,995.85, down 152 points, or 0.69%.

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Only four stocks — Bharti Airtel, Power Grid, Infosys, and Larsen and Toubro — were in the green at Sensex while at Nifty, 36 stocks were losing and the remaining 14 ended higher.

Notably, losses in shares of select banking heavyweights, including HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank and Axis Bank, dragged the indices most.

The biggest losers on the Nifty included Apollo Hospitals, Nestle India, ONGC, Adani Enterprises, and Titan Company, while gainers were Bharti Airtel, Power Grid Corporation, Hindalco Industries, Bajaj Auto, and LTIMindtree.

A long build-up was seen in Multi Commodity Exchange of India, Bharti Airtel, and ICICI Lombard General Insurance Company, while a short build-up was seen in Indraprastha Gas, Apollo Hospitals, and Mahanagar Gas.

Among the sectors, all sectoral indices ended lower except for Nifty Media (up 0.77%).

On the losing side were Nifty Healthcare (1.75%), Oil & Gas (1.10%) and FMCG (1.08%). The Nifty Bank index ended with a loss of 0.87%.

Further, the BSE Midcap index also ended lower by 0.39% but the BSE Smallcap index ended with a nominal gain of 0.06%.

The overall market capitalisation of the firms listed on the BSE dropped to nearly Rs 393.2 lakh crore, making investors poorer by about Rs 9 lakh crore in four sessions.

Amid a report by Public Eye calling out Nestle for adding sugar and honey to its popular infant milk and cereal products, Cerelac, the shares of Nestle India tumbled nearly 4%, registering its worst fall in three years.

Eyes are on the HDFC Bank which is scheduled to release its quarterly earnings on April 20. Expectations are that the earnings will match the strong operational update for the March quarter.

Experts believe that HDFC Bank is currently trading around the strong support area of 1470-1500 on the daily charts and is expected to maintain this level in the upcoming sessions.

HDFC Life Insurance on Thursday reported a net profit of Rs 411 crore for the January-March quarter of FY24, up by 14.8% from Rs 358 crore recorded in the year-ago period.

Following the earnings, shares of HDFC Life were trading nearly 0.95% up at Rs 610.20 apiece on BSE.

Simmering tension between Israel and Iran remains a key concern for the markets across the globe.

Major European markets, including the UK’s FTSE, France’s CAC 40, and Germany’s DAX, traded in the green when the Sensex ended.