The Hindu Business Line : Bears prevail

Bears prevailed over Friday's trading activity. The sentiment reading of the tradable counters remains bearish. Bull pressure on Monday is likely to neutralise the sentiment reading. On the contrary, the prevailing bearish sentiment is likely to be further strengthened with additional counters.

Nifty futures: The May contract opened with a bull gap of around 65 points and went up by another 20 points. However, bulls could not capitalise on their initial momentum and gave way to bears. May contract moved within a range of around 277 points. It closed with a loss of around 105 points from its previous close.

The short position in the May contract remains intact. Both the short exit and long entry levels are placed quite far away from its last traded price. In the normal course of trading, these levels are unlikely to be triggered during Monday's trading.

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Stock futures: The composition of the top-10 tradable list had minor changes. TCS moved out of the list and gave way to Ranbaxy. The ranking of the list had no changes. The top-3 tradable counters in this segment were Reliance, Tata Steel, and State Bank.

All the counters are in downtrend. There are no threats and opportunities for Monday's trading. The best is likely to be buying in Bajaj Auto. Bull pressure on Monday is likely to reverse the existing trend in this counter.

Cash segment: The composition of the top-10 tradable list had no changes. However, the ranking of the list had minor changes. Infosys moved up to sixth position and VSNL moved down to seventh position. Short exit level for ACC is placed at 902.05 and short exit level for Ranbaxy remains at 482.30.

All the exits levels are place quite far away from its last traded price. There is no buying opportunity for Monday's trading. The best is likely to be buying in Infosys. Bull move on Monday is likely to trigger the uptrend in this counter.

(Note: All price levels refer to the absolute value of the shares traded on the NSE. There is risk of loss in trading.)

The author is a technical analyst and fund management consultant.