Trump’s H-1B visa fee hike sends Indian IT stocks including Infosys, Wipro, TCS tumbling

The Trump administration’s move to raise the new H-1B petition fee to $1,00,000 has cast a shadow on India’s $283 billion IT industry and hammered stock prices on Monday.

Top losers as the market set to close on Monday include IT giants such as Tech Mahindra, Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), Infosys, Wipro, HCL Technologies, Tech Mahindra, and Coforge.

The BSE Sensex fell 466.26 points, or 0.56%, to 82,159.9, while Nifty slipped 124.70 points, or 0.49%, to 25,202.35 as of a pm on Monday.

Analysts hinted the market is likely to exhibit mixed behaviour, with the IT sector being affected by the H-1B visa issue and domestic consumption themes responding positively to the potential increase in consumption from lower GST rates kicking in from today.

On September 19 (Friday) the US President Donald Trump signed a proclamation to significantly curtail the H-1B visa programme. According to the proclamation, every application will now require a fee of $1,00,000 (₹88 lakh) per year - an attempt to curtail the overuse of the visa programme and encourage hiring of domestic workers.