Post Session Commentary - Sep 26 2008

Domestic markets witnessed sharp cut during final trading hours to close in deep red as there are large differences between Democrats and Republicans in US about the Bush Administration''s $700 billion rescue plan for the financial sector. Sentiments also dented by the failure of Washington Mutual Fund, which was acquired by JPMorgan Chase yesterday. JPMorgan Chase & Co. Inc. acquired the assets of Washington Mutual Inc.''s banking operations after federal regulators seized the ailing thrift. Under the terms of the deal, J.P. Morgan acquired all of the deposits and assets of Washington Mutual and its subsidiary Washington Mutual FSB, valued at $307 billion in assets and $188 billion in deposits.

The markets opened on down beat note and continued to exhibit weakness on the bourses. Further, Markets extended its losses to more than 3% as selling pressure intensified across the counters. Finally, US bailout delay pulled the market in extremely negative territory. BSE Sensex ended around 13,100 level and NSE Nifty closed below 4,000 mark. From the sectoral front, Reality index under performed the bench mark index as witnessed deep cut of more than 6%. Along with that, huge sell of was also witnessed in Metal, Capital Goods, Bank, Oil & Gas, Capital Goods and IT stocks. However, FMCG stocks were in limelight as witnessed buying form its baskets. The market breadth was extremely negative as 2172 stocks closed in red while 442 stocks closed in green and 59 stocks remained unchanged.

The BSE Sensex closed lower by 445.00 points at 13,102.18 and NSE Nifty ended down by 125.30 points at 3,985.25. The BSE Mid Caps and Small Caps closed with losses of 152.23 points at 4,940.82 and by 188.25 points at 5,861.78. The BSE Sensex touched intraday high of 13,486.20 and intraday low of 13,054.42.

WPI based inflation rate for the week ended 13th September 2008, was remain unchanged at 12.14% at the same level recorded a week earlier. Inflation remains unchanged even as the Finance Ministry said prices of essential items like cereals, pulses, sugar and edible oils declined on weekly basis.

Losers from the BSE are Ranbaxy Lab (8.04%), Ranbaxy Lab (4.70%), Sterlite Indus (6.28), ICICI Bank Ltd (5.83%), Grasim Indus (5.72%), Hindalco (5.17%), M&M Ltd (5.06%), BHEL (5.03%), DLF Ltd (5.01%), Tata Steel (4.88%) and Reliance Com Ltd (4.83%).

The BSE Metal index plunged 475.01 points to close at 9,502.09. Major losers are Gujarat NRE C (9.66%), Jindal Steel (7.25%), Sterlite Indus (6.28), Steel Authority (5.84%), Hincalco (5.17%) and Ispat Indus (5.06%).

The BSE Capital Goods index lost 461.94 points to close at 10,795.19. Major losers are Praj Indus (7.16%), Punj Lloyd (6.86%), Reliance Industrial Infra (6.47%), Siemens Ltd (6.33%), Usha Martin (5.84%) and Walchand In (5.12%).

The BSE Bank index dropped by 292.93 points to close at 6,570.54. As Indian Overseas Bank (7.72%), IDBI Bank Ltd (6.11%), ICICI Bank Ltd (5.83%), Canara Bank (4.32%), HDFC Bank Ltd (4.05%) and Punjab national Bank (4.03%) closed in negative territory.

The BSE Oil & Gas index ended down by 282.58 points at 9,081.43 as Aban Offshore (9.63%), Reliance Natural Resources (5.25%), Essar Oil Ltd (3.82%), ONGC Ltd (3.37%), Cairn India (2.69%) and Reliance Petr (2.45%) ended in negative territory.

The BSE Reality index closed lower by 243.23 points at 3,596.98. Losers are Akruti City (16.74%), Housing Development (8.47%), Unitech Ltd (8.03%), Anant Raj (7.95%), Orbit Co (7.77%) and Ansal Infra (7.47%).

The FMCG index gained 20.79 points to close at 2,189.07. As REI Agro Ltd (5.00%), Colgate Palm (2.41%), Dabur India Ltd (2.30%), ITC Ltd (2.04%) and HUL (1.18%) closed in positive territory.