Kamal Ghorui
The Nifty IT index plunged 19.5% in February, marking its steepest monthly decline in 17 years, as mounting fears of artificial intelligence-led disruption triggered heavy selling across technology services stocks.The fall is the sharpest since September 2008, when the index had dropped nearly 21% during the global financial crisis. The index declined in 12 of the 21 trading sessions during the month, wiping out nearly Rs 5.7 lakh crore in market capitalisation, according to data from the ET Intelligence Group.Selling pressure intensified after US-based artificial intelligence firm Anthropic unveiled new tools — Claude Cowork and Claude Code — sparking concerns about the long-term demand outlook for traditional IT outsourcing services and triggering a broader sell-off in technology stocks across US and Indian markets.
Despite the steep monthly decline, the Nifty IT index edged up 0.16% on Friday to close at 30,603.85, even as the benchmark Nifty fell 318 points, or 1.25%, to 25,178.65. The broader Nifty index declined 0.6% for the month.Among individual stocks, Coforge emerged as the worst performer, while LTIMindtree, Tech Mahindra, Persistent Systems and Infosys also underperformed the index, falling between 21% and 28% during February.Oracle Financial Services Software declined the least at 10.7%, followed by Wipro. Tata Consultancy Services, Mphasis and HCL Technologies recorded relatively moderate declines in the range of 15–18%.
