Sensex ends down 220 points at 16,877

The markets shrugged off the higher advance tax numbers reported by India Inc for the third quarter ended December as inflation concerns occupied centre-stage.

The Sensex ended at 16,877, weaker by 220 points and the Nifty closed at 5,033, lower by 72 points.

Banking and financial stocks extended their previous day's losses as the spurt in inflation for November triggered concerns the central bank may soon start tightening liquidity.

Auto stocks also drifted lower. Dalal Street opened in the positive in appreciation of the good tax numbers. There were mixed cues from the global markets. Asian mining stocks rose after copper and platinum prices climbed, while the US stocks closed at 14-month highs overnight as Abu Dhabi's $10 billion bail-out package for Dubai eased concerns.

But inflation concerns soon reared their head and progressively dragged the markets deeper into the red until close.

Reliance Communications declined 3.7% to Rs 174, HDFC Bank shed 3.2% at Rs 1,689 and Tata Motors slipped 3.1% to Rs 687 on the BSE. SBI and ICICI Bank were the other major losers.

Among the Sensex gainers, ITC rose 1.2% to Rs 251, Hindalco added 1% at Rs 141 and Infosys put on 0.3% at Rs 2506.

The market breadth was weak. Out of 2,910 stocks traded on the BSE, there were 808 advancing stocks as against 2,031 declines.

Cox & Kings topped the value charts on the BSE with a turnover of Rs 278.92 crore, followed by SBI (Rs 192.40 crore), Tata Steel (Rs 117.76 crore), DLF (Rs 103.83 crore) and ICICI Bank (Rs 100.42 crore).

Cals Refineries led the volume charts with trades of 120.56 million shares. It was followed by Unitech at 104.53 million, Suzlon at 8.65 million shares, IFCI at 7.80 million shares and Cox & Kings at 6.54 million shares.