Post Market Commentary - March 12 2008

The market closed with marginal gains after a strong start to the trading session. The market opened with handsome gains backed by the US Federal Reserve announcement to infuse $200bn into the global financial system to ease the credit crunch and to pump more liquidity into the economy. But the market was unable to sustained at higher levels gave up all its initial gains due to poor industrial production data. The industrial production (IIP) slipped to 5.3% in January 2008 as compared with 11.6% in January 2007, the lowest since October 2006, when it stood at 4.51%. Growth in the manufacturing sector declined to 5.9% in January 2008 as against 12.3% in January 2007.This fall led to the negative sentiments into the market, which in turn results in heavy profit booking across the counters. The market breadth which was strong earlier also turned weak in the final trading hours of the session. From the sectoral front, metal stocks faced heavy selling pressures while realty stocks seemed to attract the investors confidence. The BSE Sensex closed up by 4.83 points at 16,127.98 and NSE Nifty closed higher by 6.1 points at 4,872. The BSE Mid Cap and Small Cap also closed lower by 82.99 points and 27.18 points at 6,909.85 and 8,531.92 respectively.

The Capital Goods index closed up by 40.91 points at 14,101.56. Gainers are Bharat Electricals (3.53%), ABB (2.33%), Punj Lloyd (1.54%), BHEL (1.19%).

The Oil and Gas index advanced by 81.45 points to close at 10,642.09. Major gainers are Cairn India (7.24%), ONGC (2.02%), Reliance Inds (1.26%), RNRL (0.95%).

The Metal index declined by 383.83 points at 15,688.91. Major losers are SAIL (6.45%), Tata Steel (6.42%), Hindalco Inds (5.47%), Jindal Stainless (4.99%).

The Bankex index grew by 67.61 points to close at 8,554.85 as BOI (4.75%), Axis bank (3.56%), ICICI bank (2.98%), Kotak bank (2.81%), HDFC bank (2.69%) closed higher.

From the IT index, Aptech (5.44%), I-Flex (4.38%), Satyam (4.19%), Infosys (3.12%), Niit Techno (2.66%) closed lower.