Fifth straight weekly loss
It's easier to run
Replacing this pain with something numb
It's so much easier to go
Than face all this pain here all alone
It seems the bulls have nowhere to run as losses keep mounting. Every week there is more bad news either from the domestic market or from abroad. Sometimes it is the Chinese market crash, while sometimes its the unwinding of the yen carry trades. This week, the big worry across global markets was the rising delinquencies in the fragile US housing market. Locally too, the lingering worries continue over rising inflation and the possibility of further monetary tightening by the RBI. The pain keeps getting heightened with the key indices recording their fifth consecutive weekly drop. This week, selling was seen in Cement, Banking, Capital Goods, FMCG and IT stocks. The BSE 30-share Sensex lost 454 points or 3.53% during the week to close at 12430 and the NSE Nifty fell by 109 point or 2.94% to end at 3608. BHEL, SBI, HDFC Bank, ACC and ITC were among the major losers.
Capital Goods stocks declined with the BSE Capital Goods index down over 3%. BHEL slumped over 6.5% to Rs1955, L&T was down by 2.2% to Rs1448, Siemens slipped 2.6% to Rs1011 and ABB edged lower by 0.7% to Rs3463. Selling was also seen in Auto stocks. Hero Honda slipped .5% to Rs652, Maruti was down 1% to Rs779 despite announcing across the board price hike. Tata Motors declined 0.9% to Rs749 and Ashok Leyland lost 2.6% to Rs39.
Banking stocks fell following the disappointing advance tax figures of SBI. Also, concerns of another rate hike also weighed on the lenders. HDFC Bank fell by over 7.5% to Rs904. The scrip was the top loser in the Sensex. SBI declined by over 7% to Rs914 and ICICI Bank lost 5.6% to Rs810. Bank of India, PNB and Canara Bank were the major losers in the Mid-Cap space.
FMCG stocks continued their slide with blue chips leading the down fall. Cigarette major ITC plunged by over 6% to Rs145 amid fears that an impending VAT on tobacco products will hurt its topline and bottomline going forward. HLL declined 3.6% to Rs176, Colgate slipped 1.3% to Rs301 and Dabur slumped over 7% to Rs84.
Cement stocks continued to get pounded after producers last week decided to hold prices for a year. ACC fell by over 7.5% to Rs721, Gujarat Ambuja was down by over 5.5% to Rs103, Grasim also declined 3% to Rs2013. Mangalam Cement, Birla Corp and Prism Cement were the major losers among the Mid-Cap stocks.