# Which Indian sectors have foreign investors been selling?

**Oil and gas, financials, autos, FMCG, power and capital goods.** By NSDL's sector data, foreign investors net sold **US$10.8 billion** of Indian shares over the six months May to October 2026, and bought only in July and August.

**Net foreign selling, May to October 2026, in US$ billion:**

- **Oil and gas:** 3.8, sold every month, July only slightly

- **Financials:** 3.4, mostly in May

- **Autos:** 3.0

- **FMCG:** 2.6

- **Power:** 1.7, sold every month

- **Capital goods:** 1.4

**What they bought.** Services was the only sector bought in every month (US$1.8 billion), where NSE's services group is ports, airports, airlines, shipping and logistics. IT, consumer services, consumer durables and healthcare were also net bought over the period, and IT's US$1.1 billion came mostly in October.

**The five sessions to 6 November.** From the 30 October close to the 6 November close, the Nifty 50 rose 8.6%. Three of the four most-sold sectors rose more: Nifty Financial Services 10.4%, Nifty Oil and Gas 9.6% and Nifty Auto 9.4%. FMCG (7.3%), power (3.7%) and capital goods (2.3%) rose less. In the same sessions foreign institutions cut their index-futures shorts from 275,190 contracts to 149,072, a 46% fall, and their longs rose from 34,437 to 48,656, per NSE participant data. They are still net short by about 100,400 contracts. NSE's provisional cash data for 2 to 6 November shows foreign institutions buying Rs 45,960 crore and domestic institutions selling Rs 24,197 crore.

**What the data does not show.** Prices are not flows. The NSDL sector data stops at the end of October, and no source gives sector flows for 2 to 6 November. That these sectors rose while the shorts were covered is a correlation. The foreign investors may have bought back part of what they sold, or it may be the start of a longer buy. NSDL's next sector report, covering trades to about 12 November, is due about 20 to 24 November.

**Will they sell again?** The last two bounces did not hold: US$2.5 billion bought in February and then US$27.8 billion sold from March to June, and US$5.2 billion bought in July and August and then US$7.3 billion sold in September and October.

For information only. Not investment advice. Full post with the heat map: [https://www.tigzig.com/post/india-fpi-sectors-six-months-selling-nov2026](https://www.tigzig.com/post/india-fpi-sectors-six-months-selling-nov2026). Related: [is foreign money coming back to India?](https://www.tigzig.com/agents-faq/is-foreign-money-coming-back-to-india) and [how much have foreign investors taken out of Indian stocks?](https://www.tigzig.com/agents-faq/how-much-have-foreign-investors-taken-out-of-indian-stocks)

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Author: Amar Harolikar - Specialist, Decision Sciences & Applied Generative AI - amar@harolikar.com - https://www.linkedin.com/in/amarharolikar
Source: https://www.tigzig.com/agents-faq/which-indian-sectors-are-foreign-investors-selling
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