Mumbai, Jan. 24: The joy from Wedneday’s rally vanished today as investors sold heavily to make up for the losses suffered in the past few sessions. The sensex fell 372.33 points on a day when most of the global indices ended positive.

Market analysts attributed the fall, which was sharp towards the last hour of trade, to the after-effects of margin calls faced early this week. Many investors could not square off their positions at that time as stocks were ruling at very low levels.

“There were many who were stuck with losses from the past few trading sessions. As the market rallied today, they offloaded their positions at higher levels,’’ an analyst said.

However, unlike Wednesday, there were few buyers today. “Investors have bought as much as they could till yesterday, and now when they are selling there is nobody to buy,” said Sreesankar of IL&FS Investsmart.

The sensex opened strong at 17920.98, shot up to an intra-day high of 18185.10 but fell to 17221.74 at close, a loss of 2.12 per cent. FIIs sold stocks worth over Rs 2,000 crore today.

The Nifty has fallen by over 20 per cent in the past one week. This has wiped out about Rs 86,000 crore from the futures and options side.

Brokers said the margin segment had outstandings of about Rs 30,000 crore and unless they were filled up, the cash loss could not be adjusted. The bourses are headed for another bumpy ride until they find potential buyers, they added. “The market will continue to be volatile until some liquidity support comes in,’’ said V.K. Sharma of Anagram Stock Broking.

“Selling is not yet complete on the F& segment. This may pull down the market for another week. At about 14700 the market will find a strong support,” said Harendra Kumar of ICICI Direct.