Market Close: Profit taking now visible !

Modest start with a gap of 37 points in the green and moved on to touch a high of 14500 levels but could not sustain the gains as profit booking engulfed to push Indices into negative zone. Selling pressure was witnessed in selected sectors like Banking, Auto and FMCG. Market tried to recover wth smart rally by Reliance Industries after mid session led to a positive turnaround in market. Final trading hour had a fair amount of volatility with alternate bouts of buying and selling restricting the movement of the indices within a narrow range but selling pressure intensified in the market which pushed the indices to close down. Midcap and Smallcap indices closed in red inline with the frontline indices giving market a negative breadth. Not an encouraging support from the gloabl markets as most of the Asian markets ended marginally up, Hang Seng slipped by 45 points to ended in red. Europe in trading in green but ranged.

Sensex ended down 90 points at 14363. Weighing on the Sensex were losses in Tata Motors (707.95,-3 percent), ITC (166.35,-3 percent), RCVL (510.5,-2 percent), Ranbaxy (389.5,-2 percent) and Maruti (815.1,-2 percent). Losses were restricted by gains in TISCO (658.9,+5 percent), Rel Energy (570.45,+4 percent), HLL (198.45,+2 percent), BHEL (2717.7,+2 percent) and Hero Honda (693.7,+1 percent).

Punjab National Bank (PNB) reported a 17.5 % decline in net profit at Rs 238 crore for the fourth quarter ending March 31 when compared to Rs 288.67 Cr for the same period last year. The total income of the bank grew 27% to Rs 3,712 Cr for the quarter ended March 31 from Rs 2927 Cr for the corresponding quarter a year ago. The board of directors declared a 60 % final dividend at Rs 6 on shares of Rs 10 each for the financial year 2006-07 which is subject to shareholders approval. The country's second largest public sector lender has reported a net profit of Rs 1,540 Cr for the year ended March 31, as against Rs 1,439 Cr for the year ended march 31, 2006 and the total income during the period under consideration increased to Rs 12,579 Cr from Rs 10,857 Cr. The results were below market expectation. The stock ended marginally down by 1%. There was a smart recovery on indication that the Government holding would be reduced to below 51%.

India's Largest steel Maker Tata Steel Ltd. Co got approval from Vietnamese government to go ahead with plans to build a Rs 14000 cr steel plant with a local partner. It allowed state-owned Vietnam Steel Corp or Vinasteel to sign a memorandum of understanding with Tata to build the plant in central Ha Tinh province about 400 kilometers (250 miles) south of Hanoi. The plant will have the annual capacity of 4.5 million tons. Currently, Vietnam imports about 4 mn tons of steel plates. Vietnam Steel received government permission to work with Tata on a $3.5 billion steel plant in central Vietnam. Merril upgraded the stock to a buy saying that the synergies from the Corus acquisition would be significant. Target set was Rs 800. Stock surges up 4% on this news.

Technically Speaking: Sensex traded between an intraday high of 14,501 and low of 14,326. The breadth was in favor of decline as there were 1,640 declines against 950 advances. The resistance lies at 14440-14520 levels while the support is at 14200-14150 levels. The volume for the day stood at Rs.5290 Cr. We can see some correction before resuming the upward Trend..