Pulse of the Street: Seven weeks down, a recovery remains elusive

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A touch of green on Friday failed to save Indian equity benchmarks from a seventh consecutive weekly decline, marking their longest losing streak since the post-pandemic rout. Selective buying in realty and consumer stocks were insufficient to break a market slide that has dragged on since mid-August.
A Mint analysis shows that the Sensex’s seven-week slide from 14 August to 25 September matches its losing streak during the February–April 2020 pandemic sell-off.
It surpasses the six-week declines in early 2026 amid West Asia tensions and rising crude prices, and in mid-2025, when US tariff concerns and subdued earnings weighed on sentiment. Foreign selling compounded both downturns. The index also recorded five-week losing stretches in 2022 and 2023.
Crude oil futures fell 1.4% to $105.06 a barrel on Friday as investors weighed hopes of a possible US-Iran truce against renewed risks to Saudi Arabia’s oil infrastructure. Yet prices above $100 remained a headwind for oil-importing India.
“The seven-week slide looks more like a time correction than a capitulation, since weekly losses have been modest,” said Rishabh Nahar, partner and fund manager at Qode Advisors.
“Crude above $100 remains the main brake, pressuring the rupee and inflation and limiting room for rate relief. Persistent FPI (foreign portfolio investor) selling and heavy primary-market supply are also weighing on rebounds. A sustained fall in oil could trigger a reversal. Next week, we will track Brent, US bond yields, FPI flows and early Q2 business updates,” he added.
Narrow rebound
Realty provided the week’s strongest sectoral showing, with the BSE Realty index gaining 3.4%. Consumer durables advanced 1.3%, offering another pocket of resilience amid broader weakness.
Telecommunications led the declines, falling 2.2%. Information technology (IT) followed with a decline of about 1.7%, and power lost 1.5%. Financial services, capital goods and automobile stocks also retreated.
“The recent sector divergence appears more like selective rotation than a broad-based shift, as the realty index has also remained weak and its 3.4% weekly gain looks more like a technical bounce than a confirmed trend reversal,” said Puneet Singhania, director at Master Capital Services. “IT continues to face pressure, while financial stocks have been hit by the latest Irdai (Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India) proposals to lower commission caps and tighten expense norms, which could affect insurance distribution income for banks and NBFCs (non-banking financial companies).”
Quarterly earnings will provide a clearer test of demand, margins and profit growth, he added.
Mayank Jain, market analyst at Share.Market by PhonePe, said the contrast reflected selective buying in businesses linked to domestic demand, while cautious global spending and foreign selling weighed on IT and financial stocks.
With earnings growth moderating, investors were becoming more selective rather than returning broadly to equities, he added.
Asia’s technology advantage
India also lagged several major Asian markets. South Korea’s Kospi gained 2.7%, Japan’s Nikkei 225 rose 2.1%, and Taiwan’s Taiex advanced 1.8% in the weekly snapshot.
The regional picture was not uniformly positive. China’s CSI 300 declined 1.5%, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng fell 1%, while Indonesia’s Jakarta Composite dropped about 3.1%.
Singhania attributed part of India’s underperformance to differences in market composition. South Korea, Taiwan and Japan benefit more directly from the global artificial intelligence and semiconductor investment cycle, while Indian equities have greater exposure to services and domestic demand.
Lower relative valuations also helped draw global investors to East Asian markets. In India, elevated crude prices and moderating earnings growth weighed on sentiment, although easing geopolitical tensions and cheaper oil could support a recovery, Jain said.
Qode Advisors’ Nahar said India’s valuation premium remained difficult to defend without stronger earnings upgrades. The coming results season would therefore be important in determining whether that premium was justified.
Financial rules in focus
Regulatory developments added another consideration for financial stocks. The board of India’s markets regulator on Thursday approved the portfolio managers route for investing in mutual fund units, or PRIM, with a minimum investment of ₹25 lakh, below the ₹50 lakh threshold for conventional portfolio management services.
The route will allow portfolio managers to build portfolios using direct mutual fund plans, including exchange-traded funds, index funds and specialised investment funds.
Separately, proposed insurance commission and expense caps raised questions about the trade-off between lower costs for insurers and weaker income for distributors.
Nahar said PRIM could broaden access to professional portfolio management and benefit wealth managers operating at scale, although revenue per client could be thinner. The insurance proposals could favour efficient insurers while putting near-term pressure on distributors’ earnings, he added. The final rules will determine the extent of that impact.

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