The Hindu Business Line : Bank, oil stocks decline

THE bloodbath across sectors and categories in the markets on Friday reaffirmed that the bears were in the drivers' seat. The bearish undertone in the market was evident in the advances-declines ratio of 3:1 in favour of the declines. Banking and oil stocks were the most hit.

The markets reflected the pattern on major global indices, which have been falling on concerns of a slower growth in the US economy.

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The Sensex lost 130 points and the S&P CNX Nifty shed 2 per cent. The Sensex has fallen by about 5 per cent in April. The midcap indices on the BSE and the NSE closed lower by about 1.5 per cent.

Reliance, ICICI Bank, Hindustan Lever, Satyam Computers dragged the bellwether indices into negative territory. Cipla, M & M and TCS were the only notable gainers on the Nifty.

Among the banking stocks, Union Bank, Andhra Bank, Bank of Baroda and Bank of India were the most, which declined by more than five per cent.

The Central Government's refusal to raise fuel prices appears to have driven the stocks of oil companies to lower levels. All the constituents of the oil-oriented index on the BSE declined, HPCL, BPCL and MRPL were the major losers.

The metal oriented index on the BSE lost over 2 per cent, steel stocks — Jindal Stainless, Kirloskar Ferrous Industries, Man Industries, Mukand and Llyod Steel shot down by over four per cent.

Almost all of the constituents on the IT-oriented index on the BSE fell, leading the pack were HCL Technologies, Patni Computers and Polaris. i-Flex shot up by 2.61 per cent after the company had announced a surge of 47 per cent in fourth-quarter earnings.

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