Pre Session Commentary - Dec 23 2008

Today the markets are expected to open up in red due to negative trading of Asian markets. And the investors will closely keep a close eye on the rollover in the derivatives market. However, for the day the market will trade in negative zone and track the behavior in the Asian and European market.

On Monday, the markets opened on a flat note and continued to trade volatile with a negative bias and ended the day in deep red. The hopes for a possible stimulus package and rate cut are getting extended day by day, which resorted in profit booking in index heavyweight. As there was not much to talk about domestic cues, the benchmark indices reacted to the behavior of the Asian Markets. In line with the Asian Markets the downtrend was followed by the European markets, which ended the session in red. The Sensex breached the sensitive mark of 10,000 and closed in a four-digit mark. Sensex and Nifty lost 1.69% and 1.24%. Oil & Gas, Bankex, Metal, Capital Goods and Auto conceded lose of 3.02%, 2.48%, 1.52%, 0.99% and 1.36% respectively. The market is likely to turn volatility with negative bias. Also, as Thursday being holiday on the occasion of Christmas most data like Derivatives expiry and Inflation are expected to come out a day early

The BSE Sensex closed lower by 171.56 points at 9,928.35 and NSE Nifty ended low by 39 points at 3,077.50. The BSE Mid Caps and Small Caps ended with loss of 4.20 points and 9.07 points at 3,259.79 and 3,734.95 respectively. The BSE Sensex touched intraday high of 10,173.34 and intraday low of 9,894.01.

On Monday, the US markets closed in weak note. The investors are worried over the impact of recession on the corporate profits on more evidence the year-long recession will keep eating into corporate profits, while retailers tumbled on worry the holiday shopping season could be the worst in nearly 40 years. Crude oil for February delivery fell 1.5 percent to $39.31 barrel in New York after plunging 5.8 percent yesterday

The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) closed low with 59.42 points at 8,519.69, whereas NASDAQ index dropped by 31.97 points at 1532.35 and the S&P 500 (SPX) also closed lower by 16.25 points to close at 871.63 points.

Indian ADRs ended mixed. In technology sector, Infosys gained by 2.03% and Satyam that gained by 5.49% whereas Wipro lost by 3.58% and Patni Computers closing low by 2.11%. In banking sector ICICI Bank plunged by 3.80%, HDFC Bank fell by 4.02%. In telecommunication sector, Tata Communication plunged by 3.40%, while MTNL inclined by 8.91%.

Today the major stock markets in Asia opened weak. The Shanghai Composite is trading low by 67.77 points at 1,919.98 Hang Seng is low by 374.60 points at 14,247.79. Further Japan''s Nikkei is closed on the occasion of Emperor’s Birthday. Tiwan weighted low by 163.69 points at 4,371.85 and Singapore’s Strait Times is down by 8.55 points at 1,737.08. The Asian Markets are trading low as there are no positive cues flowing in the market and even if there are any then they are not enough to curtail the downtrend. Today China came out with a rate cut, but the reaction in the Chinese market is negative and the same could shadow on the rest of the market.

The FIIs on Monday stood as net buyers in equity and debt. Gross equity purchased stood at Rs 2,243.30 Crore and gross debt purchased stood at Rs 174.30 Crore, while the gross equity sold stood at Rs 1,780.40 Crore and gross debt sold stood at Rs 61.50 Crore. Therefore, the net investment of equity and debt reported were Rs 462.90 Crore and Rs 112.70 Crore respectively.

On Monday Indian Rupee closed at 48.01/03 a dollar, about 1.6% weaker than Friday''s close of 47.26/27. Negative stocks and positive offshore dollar/rupee and some corporate (dollar) buying between 47.30-47.50 have pulled the rupee lower.

On BSE, total number of shares traded were 34.63 Crore and total turnover stood at Rs 3,861.10 Crore. On NSE, total number of shares traded were 72.15 Crore and total turnover was Rs 10,149.04 Crore.

Top traded volumes on NSE Nifty – Unitech with 102398902 shares, Suzlon Energy with total volume traded 5253028867 shares, Reliance Petro with 21061405 shares, DLF with 18832155 shares, followed by SAIL with 10024713 shares.

On NSE Future and Options, total number of contracts traded in index futures was 1038615 with a total turnover of Rs 15088.39 Crore. Along with this total number of contracts traded in stock futures were 1436665 with a total turnover of Rs 15905.39 Crore. Total numbers of contracts for index options were 1013251 with a total turnover of Rs 15661.70 Crore and total numbers of contracts for stock options were 61334 and notional turnover was Rs 665.61 Crore.

Today, Nifty would have a support at 2,900 and resistance at 3,170 and BSE Sensex has support at 9,725 and resistance at 10,200.