Bears strike back, Sensex sheds 145 points

Former US Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan warned about the boom in Chinese equities and the Asian markets declined in the morning trades. Mirroring the fall, the market back home opened on weak note at 14345, down 18 points. The market managed to pick up the momentum in mid-morning trades and touched the intra-day high of 14390. But the profit booking in index heavyweights Tata Steel, SBI and HDFC Bank pulled the Sensex down to touch the day's low of 14174. However, the Information Technology index and Consumer Durables index bucked the trend and closed in the green. While the market remained choppy for most of the trading session, the resumption of buying at lower levels helped the Sensex to pare some losses towards the close. However, the Sensex finally closed the session after shedding 145 points at 14218, while the Nifty lost 41 points at 4205.

The breadth of the market was negative, with the losers outnumbering the gainers in the ratio of 1.48:1. Of the 2,646 stocks traded on the BSE, 1,523 stocks declined, 1,027 stocks advanced and 95 stocks ended unchanged. Among the sectoral indices, the BSE Metal index was the major loser and crumbled by 1.62% followed by the BSE Oil & Gas index (down 1.47%), the BSE Bankex index (down 1.45%).

Out of the 30 Sensex stocks only six gained and the remaining 24 ended in negative territory. Sliding sharply Tata Steel crumbled by 4.14% at Rs632, Reliance Energy plunged 3.38% at Rs551, Reliance Communication dropped 3.28% at Rs494, ACC slumped by 3.26% at Rs858, HDFC declined by 2.57% at Rs1,755, Hero Honda shed 2.41% at Rs677, Ranbaxy fell by 2% at Rs382 and HDFC Bank lost 1.94% at Rs1,090. The other front-line stocks also bore the brunt of the selling pressure and declined around 1-2% each. Among the select gainers NTPC attracted strong buying support and moved up by 4.30% at Rs162, HLL was up nearly 1.41% at Rs201 while Satyam Computers, Tata Motors, Infosys and Gujarat Ambuja Cement gained marginally.

Metal stocks took a sharp beating on the bourses. After Tata Steel, Monnet Ispat plunged by 4.13% at Rs283, Shree Precoated Steel crumbled by 3.94% at Rs311, Essar Steel dropped 3.30% at Rs38 and Ramsarup Industries shed 3.30% at Rs151. Select oil stocks also declined sharply, Dolphin Offshore dropped 4.87% at Rs212, IOC lost 4.09% at Rs482, HPCL slipped by 3.99% at Rs288 and BPCL fell 3.54% at Rs371.

Over 1.56 crore Reliance Natural Resources shares changed hands on the BSE followed by Hilton Metal (1.32 crore shares), IFCI (59.54 lakh shares), Idea Cellular (57.27 lakh shares) and Nagarjuna Fertilizers (54.68 lakh shares).

Value-wise Reliance Capital registered a turnover of Rs247 crore on the BSE followed by Reliance Industries (Rs147 crore), Advanta (Rs133 crore), ICRA (Rs127 crore) and Devi's Lab (Rs110 crore).