Sensex falls by 90 points in early trade

The BSE Sensex fell by over 90 points in morning trade on Monday on sustained selling driven by economic growth concerns amid a weakening trend on other Asian bourses.

The 30-share BSE benchmark index, which lost 18.93 points in the previous session, fell further by 90.19 points, or 0.57 per cent, to 15,758.61 in opening trade on Monday.

In a similar fashion, the wide-based National Stock Exchange Nifty index declined by 27.85 points, or 0.59 per cent, to 4,719.05.

Brokers said Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's statement that the economy is expected to grow at 7 per cent this fiscal, lower than the earlier forecast of about 9 per cent, dampened the trading sentiment.

In addition, a weakening trend in other Asian markets fuelled the selling pressure, they said.

Capital goods, metal and banking stocks, which had shown some signs of a recovery in the past few sessions, slid in early trade on Monday.

In the Asia region, Hong Kong's Hang Seng index was down by 1.11 per cent, while the Tokyo Stock Exchange was closed. The US Dow Jones Industrial Average ended 0.45 per cent lower in the previous session.