A heavy sell-off was witnessed on Monday as the market opened with benchmark indices crashing over 5 per cent in early trade.

This was tracking a global rout sparked by reciprocal tariffs announced by the US and the retaliation by China.

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Registering its worst opening since March 2020, at the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Sensex nosedived 3,939.68 points or 5.22 per cent to touch an intraday low of 71,425.01. Nifty tanked 1,160.80 points or 5 per cent to 21,743.65.

Also, this marked the sharpest single-day fall since June 4, 2024, when the indices had plunged more than 8 per cent.

Trump’s latest round of tariff hikes and China’s retaliatory measures triggered panic across global markets.

Radhika Rao, Executive Director and Senior Economist at DBS Bank, has shared the Macro Insights Weekly: Asia’s playbook for Trump’s tariff storm, where she highlighted that the global markets and economies are still struggling to absorb the seismic tariff shock of last week.

”Risk is now between stagflation and outright recession in the US and the associated spillovers. For the US, we see 1 per cent upside to inflation and 1 per cent downside risk from the baseline forecast,” she said.

In the Indian Stock Market, Tata Steel led the decline with a drop of over 10 per cent, followed by Tata Motors, which fell over 9 per cent.

Infosys, HCL Tech, Tech Mahindra, Reliance Industries, TCS, and L&T also witnessed sharp losses.

The Nifty banking index was down by over 4 per cent. HDFC Bank had slipped 3.5 per cent to Rs 1,450, while State Bank of India shed 5.1 per cent to Rs 520.

ICICI Bank was down 4.2 per cent at Rs 825, Axis Bank had fallen 3.8 per cent to Rs 780, and Kotak Mahindra Bank was trading 4.0 per cent lower at Rs 1,700.

Equities across Asia felt the brunt as Hong Kong’s Hang Seng tanked nearly 11 per cent, and Tokyo’s Nikkei 225 dropped 7 per cent.

Shanghai Composite lost over 6 per cent, South Korea’s Kospi fell 5 per cent, while the Japanese stock futures had to be halted briefly in early trade after hitting lower circuit limits.