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Suresh Parthasarathy

The stock market continued its upward journey for the fourth straight trading session. After going through a rather roller-coaster ride during mid-session, the benchmark indices nearly gave up all the gains accumulated during the early hours of Thursday.

However, short covering in the derivatives segment - with Thursday being the final day of the settlement for July contracts - helped pull up the cash market into the green during the final hour of trading. This is the record fourth winning streak for the market during which it has gained more than 100 points in each of the sessions.

The overall market breadth remained positive, with the advances to declines ratio at 1.5:1. Overall bullishness was also witnessed in both the BSE Mid-cap and Small-cap indices.

Buzzing Stocks

Dr Reddy's has reported a nearly four-fold increase in its first quarter net profit. The street lapped up the good results helping the stock post a gain of Rs 44 to close the day at Rs 1,367. Other prominent gainers in the BSE were Engineers India, MICO, Tata Tea, HDFC, Ramco Systems and IPCA Laboratories.

Sector focus

Among the key sectoral gainers during Thursday's trading were consumer durables, capital goods, auto and banking.

In consumer durables segment, the prominent gainers were Titan Industries, Goldiam International, Lloyd Electrical and Rajesh Exports.

Gitanjali Gems was amongst the ones to close in the red.

Among the capital goods pack Bharat Electronics gained Rs 59 to end the day at Rs 1,099. The other gainers were BHEL, Jyoti Structural gained five per cent each and Larsen & Toubro and Punj Lloyd added two to three per cent. Astra Microwave Products, Alfa Laval and Bharat Bijlee were the losers.

Click here for table

In the auto sector Cummins India gained 12 per cent to close at Rs 193.7. Bajaj Auto and M&M gained two to three per cent and other prominent gainers from the segment were Maruti Udyog and Ashok Leyland.

On a day when bulls and bears played tug-of-war in the market, the ones to close in the red were Balkrishna Industries and Hero Honda.

Stock-Specific Action

Alstom Projects India declared the first quarter results on Thursday. The company's net profit almost doubled from Rs 6.7 crore to Rs 11.6 crore. The market reacted positively to the result and the stock gained 10 per cent to close for the day at Rs 237.8.

Banking major State Bank of India announced the results for the April-June quarter and the net profit dropped below the expectation of the street. However, the stock ended the day in the green adding Rs 9 to the previous close.

Indian Overseas Bank surged four per cent, after news of the bank posting a net profit of Rs 222 crore compared with Rs 183 crore for the corresponding previous year quarter.

Indian Hotels with its chain of Taj hotels has declared that its first quarter net profit almost doubled. The company's board also approved splitting each of the company's shares into Rs 10 paid-up. The stock appreciated by Rs 39 to end the day at Rs 1,193.

Nagarjuna Construction Company announced that the company has bagged new orders aggregating Rs 118 crore. The stock moved up by Rs 1.3 to close the day at Rs 237.5

Allsec Technologies, Bombay Rayon Fashion, ONGC, Wipro, Amar Remedies and Hindustan Lever were part of the gainers list. National Aluminium, GAIL, Ranbaxy Laboratories, Jet Airways and BPCL were the prominent losers in NSE.

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