The Hindu Business Line : Modest TCS listing hits sentiment

EVEN as the oil prices showed signs of easing, the markets responded on a cautious note, with the Sensex staging a late recovery to settle higher by 21.17 points (or 0.42 per cent) and closing at 5088.56 points.

The Sensex opened for the day at 5073.23, touched a high of 5093.27 (in the last hour of trading) and a low of 5054.56 (early in the trading session). The relatively modest listing of the Tata Consultancy Services stock at the BSE and NSE also affected sentiment to some extent in the early part, but the Sensex recorded most of the gains in the last hour of trading.

Among the BSE sectoral indices, the sectors which outperformed the Sensex were BSE Capital Goods, BSE Bankex, BSE PSU, BSE-Oil and gas, and BSE-FMCG. BSE Capital Goods and BSE Bankex clearly outperformed the rest with gains of 1.23 per cent and 1.09 per cent respectively.

Click here for table

The sectors which tended to lag the Sensex were BSE - IT and BSE - Metals which lost 1.08 and 0.17 per cent respectively.

The S&P CNX Nifty also ended the day on a positive note, with an appreciation of 4.1 points (or 0.26 per cent). Among the top five gainers in the Nifty were Dr. Reddy's Labs, Reliance Energy, BHEL, State Bank of India and Tata Tea. The top five losers were Wipro, Colgate, Infosys Technologies, VSNL and Tata Chemicals.

The Nifty Junior also toed the Nifty line, gaining 0.54 per cent to close at 3045.65 points. The top five gainers among Nifty Junior constituents were Chennai Petroleum, Syndicate Bank, Union Bank of India, Vijaya Bank and IDBI. The five losers were Ashok Leyland, GE Shipping, TVS Motors, Polaris and CMC.

The biggest event of the day was the listing of the TCS stock at the BSE and NSE. The TCS stock listed at the BSE at Rs 1,050, touched a high of Rs 1,080 and closed for the day at Rs 987.50. Nearly 65.36 lakh shares were traded during the course of the day.

Among the significant gainers during the day were Punjab Alkalies, Bajaj Tempo, JMC Projects, Igarashi Motors, Power Trading Corporation, Petronet LNG, Dr. Reddy's and Chennai Petroleum.

The Punjab Alkalies stock was among the significant gainers with the stock appreciating by 19.77 per cent to close for the day at 12.84. The trading volumes in the stock soared from 44,479 shares on Tuesday's trading to 3 lakh shares during the day's trading.

The Power Trading Corporation stock was also in the limelight, with the stock appreciating by Rs 3.25 (or 6.52 per cent) to settle for the day at Rs 53.05. Compared to 10.46 lakh shares traded on Tuesday, the trading volumes in the stock jumped five-fold to 54.15 lakh shares. This was in line with the trend in power stocks, which attracted heightened activity such as Tata Power and Reliance Energy among others.

The sugar stocks also attracted activity, with low profile Rana Sugars stock gaining 14 per cent, while Bajaj Hindusthan gained nearly 5 per cent during the day.

The NDTV stock was the other prominent gainer, with robust trading activity in the stock. The stock gained Rs 4.15 to close for the day at Rs 87.55. The trading volumes in the stock rose from a mere 9,149 shares on Tuesday to 1.05 lakh shares during the day.

Among the prominent losers during the day were Colour Chem which lost nearly 20 per cent, Rayban Sun Optics nearly 10 per cent and Wimco 3.96 per cent. The other losers were stocks from the Tata stable, especially those which were inthe IT sector, namely Tata Infotech, Tata Elxsi and CMC.