The Sensex at the Bombay Stock Exchange, which lost over 78 points in opening trade, recovered some ground in late morning deals and was trading 28 points in the negative territory at 17,679, when reports last came in.The fall in the Sensex was attributed to fresh selling by funds, amid a weakening trend on other Asian bourses.In a similar fashion, the wide-based Nifty of the National Stock Exchange was trading 5 points down at 5,3564. Metal, IT and oil and gas stocks led the decline.In the Asia region, Hong Kong's Hang Seng index was down by 1.08 per cent and Japan's Nikkei index shed 0.56 per cent in morning trade today.