The Hindu Business Line : Oil & gas pack advance in value; major IT scrips slip

In a volatile trading session, the bulls prevailed and continued their relentless march. The Sensex notched up a gain of 73.6 points to breach 11,600 points. In the first hour of trade, it breached the 11,700-mark, before retreating to lower levels. However, heightened activity picked up in the last hour of trade. The market breadth continued to be positive, with 1,547 stocks appreciating in value, compared to 994 stocks that logged declines.

Buzzing sectors

Banking was the sector that stole the show during the day's trading. Some of the key banking stocks that were buzzing were HDFC Bank, Andhra Bank, Centurion Bank of Punjab, Indian Overseas Bank and IndusInd Bank. The other sectors that were also in the limelight were FMCG, capital goods, oil and gas and healthcare.

Practically, the entire oil and gas pack advanced in value, with stocks such as Hindustan Petroleum, Mangalore Refineries, Bharat Petroleum, Essar Oil and Chennai Petroleum figuring among the prominent gainers. Among capital goods and engineering, Thermax proved to be the biggest gainer, followed by Greaves Cotton, Alstom Projects and Gammon India.

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On the contrary, the sectors that were in the backfoot were technology, which had hogged the attention on Monday's trading, metals and automobiles. Most of the prominent stocks such as Satyam, Wipro, Infosys and TCS slipped into the negative territory or recorded marginal gains. i-flex Solutions bucked the overall trend, gaining 3.8 per cent to close at Rs 1407. In the automobile pack, while tyre stocks such as Apollo Tyres continued to advance, other prominent stocks such as Tata Motors and Bajaj Auto ended in the red.

Geometric Software and Thermax were the stocks that rocked during the day's trading. While Geometric ended the day with a gain of 19.27 per cent, Thermax clocked a gain of 14.9 per cent. The Hinduja TMT stock has been another strong gainer, posting a 11 per cent rise. This stock's run-up is factoring, to some extent, its shareholding in Hutchison Essar, the telecom entity that is likely to be listed later this year.

EVENT SPECIFIC ACTION

After a long spell of dampened sentiment, Hindustan Petroleum appreciated by 7.5 per cent to close at Rs 350.35. The move has to be seen in the light of the company bagging an oil block in Oman. It has been working in a consortium with Oilex of Australia, Gail (India) and Bharat Petroleum. Other oil stocks have also moved in sympathy with this trend.

MphasiS BFL ended in the negative territory, with the stock shedding 1.8 per cent to close at Rs 211.90. With EDS making a conditional offer to pick up a 52 per cent equity stake in MphasiS at an offer price of Rs 204.50, it appears to have dampened sentiment.

IL&FS Investment Managers perked up by 5 per cent, on the heels of the board considering a bonus of 1:2 and raising of funds from the international markets to the tune of $60 million and increase in FII holding to 74 per cent.