Earnings season sets in; Infy fails to cheer

Today's major news

Infosys Technologies Q4FY2010 net income at Rs1,600 crore; the stock jumps 3.69% up

Reserve Bank of India relaxes norms on collaterals for foreign institutional investors

SEBI, IRDA to approach High Court on unit-linked insurance plan row

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Global signals

European stocks fell as declining metal prices hurt the earnings outlook for commodity producers and Alcoa posted sales that missed analysts` estimates. At the time of writing of this report, FTSE 100 (London) was trading 0.23% lower.

All the major Asian indices closed in the negative territory on Tuesday, except Shanghai Composite (China) and Kospi (Korea). SGX Nifty closed nine points lower.

US stock futures point to a weak start for the Wall Street on Tuesday ahead of February international trade figures to be announced later on the day.

Indian indices

The domestic market edged lower on a second day in a row on the back of not-so-encouraging global equities. The market slipped despite good FY2010 March quarter numbers posted by information technology (IT) bellwether Infosys Technologies.

The Sensex opened 22 points lower (at 17831) but turned positive soon for few moments to touch the day’s high of 17893 before slipping back into negative. With auto and banking stocks under pressure, the Sensex hit the day’s low of 17736. However, the market pared its losses on robust buying in IT stocks led by Sensex heavyweight— Infosys Technologies. At closing bell, the Sensex quoted at 17822, 31 points lower while Nifty shut at 5323, 17 points down.

Market sentiment

Trailing shares outnumbered gaining ones. Of the 2,964 stocks traded on the BSE, 1,527 (51%) stocks declined, whereas 1,359 (46%) stocks advanced. Seventy eight stocks remained unchanged.

Sectoral & stock screening

IT stocks were the top performers — up by 3.09%. BSE TECk and BSE Power were the other two counters that posted gains. The remaining 10 sectors were down, with Auto index down by 1.32% — the most for any sector —to be followed by banking counter that declined 0.87%.

On stocks’ front, IT bellwether Infosys Technology surged the most by 3.69%, followed by Indiabulls Financial that rose 3.54% and Balrampur Chini Mills that jumped 3.47% up. Among losers, Hero Honda slid the most by 5.29%, followed by Procter & Gamble that fell 3.95%

Viewing volumes

Sugar major Balrampur Chini Mills was the most actively traded share with over 0.30 crore shares changing hands on the BSE, followed by steel maker Ispat Industries (0.26 crore shares), Industrial finance company IFCI (0.26 crore shares), India’s second largest realty major Unitech (0.23 crore shares) and wind turbine major Suzlon Energy (0.22 crore shares).