Indian share markets witnessed huge selling pressure throughout the day today and ended deep in the red.

Russia's invasion of Ukraine launched a full-fledged attack on Indian equities today, with benchmarks dropping as much as 5%.

Commodities markets, meanwhile, surged with Brent oil extending gains above US$100 a barrel (for the first time since 2014, while gold jumped as investors scrambled for havens.

The monthly futures and options (F&O) expiry also added to deeper cuts during the fag-end of the session.

The benchmarks are moving from 'correction zone' to 'bear zone' as they have plunged nearly 16% from their January peaks. This was also their biggest one-day fall since March 2020, when the Covid-19 pandemic had roiled the markets.

At the closing bell, the BSE Sensex stood lower by 2,702 points (down 4.7%).

Meanwhile, the NSE Nifty closed lower by 815 points (down 4.8%).

Tata Motors and IndusInd Bank were among the top losers today.

The SGX Nifty was trading at 16,225, down by 856 points, at the time of writing.

In the broader markets, the BSE Mid Cap and the BSE Small Cap indices slumped 5.5% and 5.7%, respectively.

On the sectoral front, realty stocks, auto stocks and telecom stocks were among the hardest hit.

Asian stock markets ended on a weak note today.

The Hang Seng and the Shanghai Composite ended down by 3.2% and 1.7%, respectively. The Nikkei ended down by 1.8% in today's session.

US stock futures are trading on a weak note today with the Dow Futures trading down by 581 points.

The rupee is trading at 75.26 against the US$.

Gold prices for the latest contract on MCX are trading up by 2.5% at Rs 51,615 per 10 grams.

Here are Top 5 Factors Why Indian Stock Markets Crashed Today

Russia makes its move: Russian forces were reportedly bombarding certain Ukrainian cities even before Putin's address ended that announced launch of special military action in Eastern Ukraine.

Russia's action is possibly a worst-case scenario from investors' perspective. Although a lot will depend on how North Atlantic Treaty Organisation (NATO) reacts to Russia's action.

US Federal Reserve meeting outcome: The US Federal Reserve is scheduled to meet on 15-16 March to review interest rates.

Given the inflation rate at a four-decade high, the Fed seems all set to hike rates in the policy meet. According to market experts, the markets so far seem to have factored in a 25-basis point (bp) rate hike, any disparity in expectations could result in a knee jerk reaction for the markets.

Crude oil prices: Brent crude broke above the US$100-mark in trade on Thursday, after Russia ordered troops to invade Eastern Ukraine. With global economies battling inflation, soaring oil prices can further fuel inflation and in turn disturb the fiscal math. If the prices remain elevated for long, it will have an impact on corporate earnings growth across some sectors as well over the next few quarters.

Assembly polls: The results for the state elections in five states, including Uttar Pradesh, Punjab will be announced on 10 March 2022.

The BJP is the ruling government in Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand and Goa.

Although there may not be a direct correlation between the elections and markets, any favourable verdict for BJP in non-ruling states such as Punjab and Manipur could boost the sentiment, whereas any adverse outing in the presently ruled states could be a sentiment dampener.

Financial Year-end portfolio rebalancing: The foreign institutional investors (FIIs) have been net sellers in the last few months amid fears of change in interest rate cycle in the US.

Given the high magnitude of sales, financial year-end portfolio rebalancing could impact select index heavyweights, and thus the index.

We will keep you updated on how these factors develop in the coming days and what effect they have on Indian stock markets. Stay tuned!

In news from the travel support service sector, IRCTC was among the top buzzing stocks today.

Bharat Heavy Electricals (BHEL) has successfully commissioned a 1.7-megawatt solar photovoltaic plant at Bina in Madhya Pradesh for the Indian Railways.

The plant will directly feed power to traction systems of Indian Railways. The move to create a solar plant was taken after Indian Railways decided to be self-reliant for its energy needs and solarise railway stations by utilizing its vacant lands for renewable energy (RE) projects.

The Ministry of Railways has decided to install solar power plants on its vacant unused lands on mega scale.

The use of solar power will accelerate the Minister of Railways, Shri Piyush Goyal's mission to achieve conversion of Indian Railways to 'Net Zero' carbon emission railway.

Indian Railways present demand would be fulfilled by the solar projects being deployed, making it the first transport organisation to be energy self-sufficient. This would help in making Indian Railways green as well as 'Atma Nirbhar'.

It has started energy procurement from various solar projects like 3 MWp solar plant set up at MCF Raebareilly (UP). About 100 MWp rooftop solar systems have already been commissioned on various stations and buildings of Indian Railways.

The one project of 1.7 MWp at Bina (Madhya Pradesh) which shall be connected directly to overhead traction system has already been installed and is presently under extensive testing.

It is likely to be commissioned within 15 days. This is the first of its kind project in the world commissioned by Indian Railways in collaboration with BHEL.

It involves adoption of innovative technology for converting direct current (DC) to single phase alternating current (AC) for feeding directly to Railway's overhead traction system.

The solar power plant has been established near the Bina Traction Sub Station (TSS). It can produce approximately 25 lakh units of energy annually and will save around Rs 13.7 m for railway every year.

IRCTC share price ended the day down by 9.3% on the BSE.

Speaking of PSUs, have a look at the chart below which shows the performance of BSE PSU index compared to BSE Sensex over the past few years.

(Click on image to enlarge)

As can be seen from the chart above, over the last decade, Rs 100 invested in BSE PSU index would have eroded to Rs 80, compared to almost 3x gains for the Sensex.

Here's what Richa Agarwal, lead Smallcap Analyst at Equitymaster, wrote about PSU stocks in one of the edition of Profit Hunter:

• However, it will be folly to paint all PSUs with the same brush. There are some exceptions in this space, which put their private peers to shame.
  
  In a recent editorial, I shared an opportunity in a PSU stock that is riding and enabling an irreversible megatrend - digitisation.

Moving on to news from the realty sector...

Ashoka Buildcon Receives LoA for Rs 6.9 bn Project

Ashoka Buildcon said that it has received letter of acceptance (LoA) from Northeast Frontier Railway for a project involving electrification of railway lines in the state of Assam on EPC mode.

The accepted offer of the project is Rs 6.9 bn. The contract period is 900 days.

Ashoka Buildcon is engaged in the construction & maintenance of roads and supporting services to land support-operation of toll roads.

The company's consolidated net profit surged to Rs 3.9 bn in the quarter ended December 2021 against Rs 884.5 m during the previous quarter ended December 2020.

Sales rose 10.34% year on year (YoY) to Rs 14.4 bn in the third quarter of the financial year 2022.

Ashoka Buildcon share price ended the day down by 11.1% on the BSE.