Foreign portfolio investors sold Rs 25,744 crore worth Indian stocks this January

New Delhi: Foreign portfolio investors have aggressively sold Indian stocks in January, turning net sellers in the Indian equity market, after making a beeline to accumulate domestic stocks during the past two months--November and December.

The latest data available from the National Securities Depository Limited (NSDL) showed that the FPIs sold Indian stocks worth Rs 25,744 crore in January.

The selling of stocks by FPIs lately has led to some corrections, though marginally, in Indian benchmark stock indices.

In December, especially, they made a beeline to invest in Indian stock markets, with a cumulative accumulation of Rs 66,135 crore.

"FPI inflows in debt have sustained, supported by India's inclusion in JP Morgan bond index and potential inclusion in Bloomberg EM Local Currency indices, and have largely offset the equities outflows," CARE Ratings had said.

To put it into context, the entire year saw an inflow of about Rs 171,107 crore, and notably, over one-third of it came in December. The strong inflow of funds from foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) had then supported the benchmark stock indices to march towards all-time highs.

In November, the FPI inflow was Rs 9,001 crore, NSDL data showed.

Before November, FPI participation in Indian stocks was lukewarm, and they had turned net sellers.

They sold Rs 14,768 crore and Rs 24,548 crore, in September and October, respectively. Before that, FPIs bought Indian stocks worth Rs 7,936 crore, Rs 11,631 crore, Rs 43,838 crore, Rs 47,148 crore, Rs 46,618 crore, and Rs 12,262 crore in March, April, May, June, July, and August respectively, data showed.