The Bombay Stock Exchange benchmark Sensex lost more than 100 points during early trade today owing to heavy selling by funds and retail investors, influenced by the weak trend in the worldwide markets.

The 30-share barometer, which marked its closure after gaining 82.39 points on Tuesday, lost 101.46 points at 14,856.45 during the first five minutes of trading.

In the same way, the broad-based Nifty dropped 34.70 points to 4,483.10.

Mr. Shrikant Chouhan, technical analyst with Kotak Securities said, “Ahead of the budget, the market is likely to stay rangebound between 4,350 and 4,550. If the market falls below 4,350 then it may even crack down to 4,100 levels.”

Stocks, which dragged the Sensex down, were Infosys declined 2.22% at Rs 1,685.95, Wipro 1.13% at Rs 92.50, TCS 1.23% at Rs 385, BHEL 1.38% at Rs 2,126, L&T 1.61% at Rs 1,502, ONGC 1.78% at Rs 1,104.50 and SBI 1.04% at Rs 1,696.20.

IT and capital goods stocks led the decline in early trade. The BSE IT index slipped 1.5 per cent. The capital goods index on the BSE dropped 0.8 per cent and the BSE metal index shed 0.8 per cent.

However, selected auto, real estate and power stocks actuated some demand and cushioned the decrease slightly.

The major gainers’ in the Sensex pack included DLF Ltd surged 1.34% at Rs 358.05, Tata Power 1.45% at Rs 1,198 and Reliance Infra 1.58% at Rs 1,288.55.

The US Dow Jones Industrial Average marked its closure after declining 1.25% on Tuesday.

In the meantime, Hong Kong Hang Seng index was trading 1.2% down, but Japan’s Nikkei was in the positive terrain and gained 0.55% in morning trade.