Fall amidst volatility

Sensex opened on a weak note at 9,435, about 152 points down from the previous close of 9,587. But a round of substantial buying in heavyweights turned Sensex positive and touched the intra-day low of 9,630. While the market witnessed a fluctuating trend in afternoon trades, the index tumbled below 9,300-mark to touch the day's low of 9,251 amid relentless selling pressure. Sensex finally ended the day with loss of 180 points at 9,407, while Nifty fell 47 points to close at 2,873.



The market breadth was extremely weak, as losers outpaced gainers. Of the 2,518 stocks traded on BSE, 1,876 stocks declined, whereas 579 stocks advanced. Sixty three stocks ended unchanged. All sectoral indices bar a few slid for the day. BSE Metal dropped 7.16% followed by BSE Realty (down 5.15%), BSE CG (down 4.70%), BSE Oil & Gas (down 2.81%), BSE CD (down 2.40%) and BSE Power (down 1.99%), while BSE FMCG (up 1.22%), BSE Auto (up 1.01%) and BSE IT (up 0.18%).



Most of index heavyweights witnessed heavy correction. State Bank of India tumbled 40.30% at Rs23.85, Reliance Communications dropped 9.61% at Rs186.65, Sterlite Industries moved down by 9.55% at Rs273.10, and Tata Steel lost 8.20% at Rs214.50. Among other major losers, Reliance Infrastructure slumped by 7.70% at Rs516.30, DLF slipped by 7.25% at Rs217.60, Larsen & Toubro shed 7.15% at Rs720.10 and Ranbaxy Laboratories lost 7.09% at Rs235.60. Tata Power fell by 5.92% at Rs748.35 and Tata Motors crumbled by 5.44% at Rs163.25. Other front-line stocks lost between 1-3% each. Select counters, however, bucked the downtrend and ended with gains. Tata Consultancy Services advanced by 6.34% at Rs535.65 and Hindustan Unilever moved up by 4.79% at Rs263.50, while National Thermal Power Corporation, Mahindra & Mahindra, Maruti Suzuki India, Wipro, Grasim Industries, HDFC, ITC, Infosys and HDFC Bank ended with modest gains.



Metal stocks were hit hard and dropped sharply. Welspun crumbled by 10.16% at Rs91.55, SAIL lost 9.02% at Rs79.20, Hindustan Zinc shed 8.76% at Rs383.35 and NMDC declined by 7.83% at Rs145.95. Sesa Goa, Jindal Saw, Ispat Industries, Jai Corp and Nalco were down over 5-4% each.



Over 8.19 crore shares of Satyam Computer Services (Satyam) changed hands on the BSE followed by Unitech (4.52 crore shares), JP Associates (2.63 crore shares), Reliance Natural Resources (2.28 crore shares) and DLF (1.88 crore shares).



DLF was the most actively traded counter on the BSE and registered a turnover of Rs378 crore followed by Reliance Industries (Rs274 crore), Reliance Capital (Rs201 crore), Jaiprakash Associates (Rs181 crore) and Satyam (Rs165 crore).