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Journalism of Courage
MUMBAI, DEC 14: Bulls made a hasty retreat amidst nervous unloading on major stock exchanges across the country on Tuesday. Pivotals led by heavyweight stocks crashed on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) today on emergence of selling pushing down the benchmark Sensex by 112.18 points or 2.40 per cent. The sentiment was affected as speculators unwound long positions on the lastday of the settlement at the National Stock Exchange (NSE).
“The indices were pulled down by four or five shares but the broader market was steady. We are in for volatile trading on Wednesday," said Ketan Jhaveri, head dealer at Kotak Securities. Hindustan Lever Ltd (HLL), which has a weightage of 21.33 per cent in the BSE index, accounted for about half of the index’s loss. HLL ended down 5.56 per cent or Rs 139 at rs 2,361 on the BSE.
Counters like Silverline, Pentafour Software and Rolta witnessed hectic activity and closed at the upper circuit. Among the heavywieghts, Wipro also closed at the upper circuit on the BSE. But the day after it closed on the higher side of the Rs 10,000 mark, the Infosys counter saw some profit-booking and the scrip closed belwo the five- figure mark at Rs 9942. Satyam Computers also witnessed selling pressure and closed lower.
ITC, the market-mover till a year ago, closed at Rs 624, a low for the scrip during the last 16 months. And according to dealers, the low volume in the ITC counter is a cause for worry for the players. “Everybody is closely watching this counter,” said a BSE broker.
During the day, HLL hit a low of Rs 2300 before recovering to close at Rs 2361, with 1.17 lakh shares changing hands on the BSE. Among the other FMCG stocks, Colgate-Palmolive, Nestle and P&G also witnessed heavy selling and closed with net loss. At Rs 441, Nestle was down to its 52-week low with 1.08 lakh shares changing hands on the BSE.
According to some players, the recent dip is good for some delivery-based buying. “We are expecting a dip of another 100 points in the Sensex from the present level, but that should give investors opportunity to go for delivery-based buying,” said Nikunj Modi at Kisan Ratilal Choksey Shares and Securities. According to Modi, currently only six scrips – Silverline, Zee Tele, Global Tele, Silverline, Pentafour Software and Satyam – are giving good returns to the traders. Of the total Rs 2900 crore outstanding position on the BSE, these six scrips together account for total outstandings to the tune of Rs 1000 crore.
But high badla rates of around 30 per cent for the last two weeks has not paid much to the operators who carried forward their positions in scrips other than these six. “So I expect the traders to maintain their positions in these six counters and at the same time liquidating in other counters. Subsequently, this will give good opportunity for delivery based buying,” Modi added. FIIs were net buyers in scrips like Pentafour Software, Wipro, HCL, Silverline besides some others. However domestic institutions pressed sales in Indian stocks. Refinery stocks stole the limelight on expectations that the sector would get benefit of rising crude oil prices.
Of the 140 specified scrips, 101 registered sharp to moderate losses while 37 showed handsome gains and two remained unchanged.
