Markets & Startups Brief — March 19

Three days of hope. Wiped out in one morning.

After a textbook three-session rally that had Dalal Street breathing easy, Thursday opened like a cold bucket of water. No warm-up. No warning. Just red — deep, wall-to-wall red.

The Nifty 50 settled at 23,090.55, crashing 687 points or 2.89%. The Sensex closed at 74,504.27 — down 2,199 points, a drop of 2.87%. At the intraday low, the Sensex was down more than 1,900 points, briefly below 75,072, and the Nifty slid under the critical 23,200 mark. Market breadth told the full story — 3,484 stocks declined out of 4,621 traded. Everything gained this week? Gone by lunch.

① Oil pulled the trigger.

Brent crude surged above $111 per barrel, fuelled by fresh West Asia conflict escalation — including direct strikes on energy infrastructure in the region. India imports nearly 85% of its crude oil. Prices sustained above $110 raise the spectre of imported inflation and a widening trade deficit — the kind of macro headache that spooks every FII desk overnight. Aviation, paints, tyres, autos — all punished.

② The Fed said no.

The US Federal Reserve held interest rates steady at 3.75%, signalling that sticky inflation may push back any rate cuts to much later in 2026. Risk appetite across global markets evaporated instantly. Wall Street bled. Asia followed. India had nowhere to hide.

③ FIIs keep walking out.

Foreign institutional investors offloaded ₹2,714 crore on March 18. Domestic institutions absorbed ₹3,253 crore — DIIs are holding the fort, but foreign capital hasn't stopped retreating. This tug-of-war has defined the last several weeks.

This was the headline that hit hardest.

HDFC Bank's part-time Chairman Atanu Chakraborty resigned with immediate effect, citing "certain happenings and practices within the bank over the last two years that are not in congruence with my personal values and ethics."

A resignation letter. Citing ethics. At India's largest private lender. Markets priced that in immediately.

HDFC Bank hit an intraday low of ₹770 on the NSE — a fresh 52-week low — with roughly ₹1.12 lakh crore in market cap wiped out in a single session. With HDFC Bank carrying nearly 19.69% weight on Bank Nifty , the avalanche dragged Axis, ICICI, SBI, and Kotak down 2–3% each.

The RBI approved Keki Mistry — former CEO of HDFC Ltd — as interim part-time chairman for three months. In a shareholder call, Mistry assured investors there were "no material matters" behind the resignation and that he would not have accepted the role if it conflicted with his own principles. The stock partially recovered. But the governance cloud? Still very much there.

HDFC Bank's valuation has dropped to approximately 2.2x Price-to-Book — a multi-year low, well below its historical premium and even its 2020 pandemic levels. Oversold value play or a deeper problem? That debate will drive the next few sessions.

Today wasn't random noise. It was three risks arriving at once — spiking oil, a hawkish Fed, and a governance shock at India's most systemically important bank, all colliding in a single session.

Sentiment is cautious-to-bearish. FIIs haven't stopped selling. Crude is north of $110. And a question mark now hangs over HDFC Bank — a stock sitting in virtually every large-cap portfolio in the country.

The risk is clear — if crude holds above $110 and the HDFC Bank story deepens into something bigger, we could revisit 22,700–23,000 on the Nifty.

The opportunity is also there — DIIs are buying every dip with conviction. HDFC Bank at 2.2x P/B is historically cheap. India's macro is stressed, not broken. Patient, selective investors may look back at this week as the entry window they were waiting for.

Key levels — Nifty support sits at 23,000. Resistance at 23,500–23,600. Bank Nifty's line in the sand is 53,000.

Watch closely — Any further HDFC Bank governance disclosures could move markets more than any global cue. The RBI's April meeting is also coming into sharp investor focus , especially for banking stocks. Keep an eye on Brent crude — every dollar above $110 is another point of pressure on India's import bill. And track US futures and any overnight West Asia headlines.

Nifty 50 closed at 23,090.55, down 687 points or 2.89%. Sensex ended at 74,504.27, shedding 2,199 points or 2.87%. Bank Nifty plunged over 3%, touching an intraday low near 53,437. Top gaining sector was Castings, Forgings & Fasteners, up 5.20%. Top losing sector was Energy & Commercial Services, down over 13%. FII flows on March 18 stood at a net outflow of ₹2,714.35 crore. DII flows countered with a net inflow of ₹3,253.03 crore. Brent crude hovered between $111–116 per barrel.

PhonePe hits pause.

Just when markets showed signs of stabilising, India's biggest fintech blinked. PhonePe paused its IPO plans amid ongoing market volatility — crude spiking, the Fed hawkish, FIIs in sell mode. Rational call. No serious company wants to debut on a red day.

Moneyview files for IPO — and it's profitable.

Here's the rare good news. Fintech startup Moneyview filed its DRHP with SEBI for an IPO comprising a fresh issue of ₹1,500 crore plus an OFS of up to 13.61 crore equity shares. The company posted revenue of ₹2,409 crore and a net profit of ₹245 crore in the nine months ended December 2025. A profitable fintech filing in this market? That's a story worth watching closely.

Markets will have brutal days. They always do.

The ones who stay informed, stay calm, and act with conviction when others are hitting sell — those are the ones who actually build wealth.

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