Post Session Commentary - July 16 2008

The domestic market lost all its strength and finally slipped to close on weak note on the back of profit booking in key stocks, which dragged the market to new 2008 lows. The Indian market opened significantly higher on crude oil’s support, which dropped $6.44 to settle at $138.74 on the New York Mercantile Exchange. Market maintained the momentum till afternoon but further lost ground due to decline in European Markets which led huge sell off over the counter and dragged market to the negative territory. The BSE Sensex slipped below 12,600 level and NSE Nifty below 3,900. From the sectoral front, Reality index were completely beaten down to close with deep cut of more than 7% as most selling was reported from this basket. Along with this, Metal, Oil & Gas, Bank, Capital Goods and Consumer Durables stocks witnessed the selling pressure. The market breadth was negative as 810 stocks closed in green while 1803 stocks closed in red and 79 stocks remained unchanged.

The BSE Sensex closed lower by 100.39 points at 12,575.80 and NSE Nifty ended down by 44.40 points at 3,816.70. The BSE Mid Caps and Small Cap closed with losses of 75.23 points and 106.45 points 5,088.28 and 6,324.45 respectively. The BSE Sensex touched intraday high of 12,935.25 and intraday low of 12,514.02.

Losers from the BSE are DLF Ltd (7.73%), JP Associates (6.09%), Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd (5.42%), HDFC (4.43%), SBI (3.32%), Tata Steel (3.29%), TCS Ltd (2.98%), TCS Ltd (2.26%), Tata Motors (2.13%) and ICIC Bank Ltd (1.83%).

Gainers from the BSE are Ranbaxy Lab (15.02%), Bharti Airtel (2.87%), ONGC (2.52%), HUL (1.77%), Ambuja Cement 1.37%), ITC Ltd (1.25%) and BHEL (0.56%).

The Metal index closed down by 289.72 points at 11,935.92. Lossers are Gujarat Nre C (7.22%), Nalco (5.71%), Jindal Saw (5.17%), Sesa Goa Ltd (5.05%), Ispat Industries (4.69%), Welspan Gujarat Sr (4.46%) and Steel Authority (3.85%).

The Reality index ended down by 284.33 points at 4,219.12. As Unitech (10.48%), DLF Ltd (7.73%), Purvankara (5.80%), Omaxe Ltd (5.25%), Sobha Dev (4.51%), and Parsvnath (4.48%) closed in negative territory.

The Banking index closed lower by 107.76 points at 5,400.24. Major losers are Union Bank (3.61%), Kotak Bank (3.60%), SBI (3.32%), Karnataka Bank (2.09%), Axis Bank (2.03%), Yes Bank (1.96%), and ICIC Bank Ltd (1.83%).

The Oil & Gas index ended down by 89.31 points at 8,588.39. As Aban Offshore (5.35%), Cairn India (4.88%), Reliance Petroleum (4.80%), Reliance Natural Resources (1.99%) and Reliance (1.59%) closed in negative territory.

The Auto Index closed lower by 82.79 points at 3,394.49. Lossers are Ashok Leyland (5.84%) along with Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd (5.42%), Bosch Ltd (3.21), Apollo Tyre (3.18%),MRF Ltd (3.09%) and TVS Motor Ltd (2.33%).

The Pharma index gained 62.16 points to close at 3,971.41. Major gainers are Ranbaxy Lab (15.02%), Divi’s Lab (2.44%), Orchid Chem (1.40%), Sterl Biotec (0.63) and Cipla Ltd (0.53%).