Mumbai, Nov 13 : The Indian stock market opened in red on Wednesday as selling was seen across sectors, except private banks, in early trade.

Sensex was trading at 78,260 after slipping 414 points and Nifty was trading at 23,706 after dropping 167 points.

The market trend remained negative. On the National Stock Exchange (NSE), 335 stocks were trading in green, while 1,948 stocks were trading in red.

Nifty Bank was at 51,194.40 after gaining 36.60 points or 0.07 per cent. Nifty Midcap 100 index was trading at 54,375.30 after falling 882.20 points or 1.60 per cent. Nifty Small cap 100 index was at 17,618.75 after a huge fall of 372.85 points or 2.07 per cent.

M&M, Tata Steel, Maruti, Sun Pharma, Reliance, Nestle India, JSW Steel and Power Grid were the top losers in the Sensex pack. NTPC, Bharti Airtel, Hindustan Unilever, Asian Paints, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Axis Bank and HDFC were the top gainers.

According to market experts, a significant feature of this year's market movements is the big variation across countries and regions.

The US is, by far, the best performing market with 26.17 per cent year-to-date (YTD) returns in S&P 500. India is now underperforming with only 9.85 per cent YTD returns in Nifty.

'The Euro Zone index Stoxx 50 has given only 5.14% YTD returns. The performance of the economy and expectations around earnings growth are the main factors behind this variation in performance,' said experts.

In Asian markets, except Jakarta and Bangkok, the markets of Shanghai, Tokyo, Seoul and Hong Kong were trading in red. The US stock markets closed in the red on the last trading day.

Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) sold equities worth Rs 3,024 crore on November 12, while domestic institutional investors bought equities worth Rs 1,854 crore on the same day.

According to Akshay Chinchalkar, Head of Research at Axis Securities, the focus now shifts to what is a critical support zone extending from 23,700 to 23,779 for Nifty.

/IANS