The Hindu Business Line : Mixed trend for Indian counters

A slew of takeover expectations such as Rupert Murdoch's News Corp-Wall Street Journal and Microsoft-Yahoo coupled with better-than-expected financial performance by US Inc helped Dow Jones Industrial Average maintain the momentum continuously. According to Bloomberg, the Dow Jones Industrial Average set four all-time highs last week, while the Standard & Poor's 500 index rose to within 1.5 per cent of breaking its March 2000 peak.

For the week, the Dow industrial average added 1.1 per cent to a record 13,264.62. The S&P 500 climbed 0.8 per cent to 1505.62. Both gained for a fifth consecutive week, the longest winning streak since October. The Nasdaq composite index rose 0.6 per cent to 2572.15.

Back home, the curtailed trading session seemed to have dampened enthusiasm of market participants with the BSE Sensex failing to sustain the 14,000 level. Profit taking in key counters pushed down the Sensex below the 14,000 mark, though it ended the week on a positive note by 0.18 per cent. The NSE's S&P CNX Nifty also finished with gains.

It was a mixed trend for the Indian ADRs. However, ICICI Bank tumbled by 6.5 per cent following its equity dilution announcement. The bank had said that it would raise additional equity capital by way of a public issue of equity shares/ADS. The capital raising is expected to be around Rs 20,000 crore ($5 billion), it had informed the exchange. The ADR closed at $41.86 against the previous week close of $44.77. The underlying equity fell by over eight per cent to Rs 855.35 (Rs 933.65).

However, the other banking counter HDFC Bank finished on a positive note at $74.16 ($73.98), a marginal gain of 0.23 per cent.

The biggest gainer was VSNL. The ADR jumped 5.5 per cent to end at $22.29 ($21.13). The company announced that it is all set to tap the international business travellers' segment by providing roaming wireless broadband service. This service will be provided to high-value travellers during their stay in India.

Among the major losers were Satyam Computer and Tata Motors and Rediff.com.

There were no major deviations on the premium front over the previous week level.

More Stories on : Stock Markets | ADR Watch

Article E-Mail :: Comment :: Syndication :: Printer Friendly Page

Stories in this Section
DSP ML plans $100-m fund

`Make advisers accountable for suggestion provided'

Can we put the fear of `crash' behind?

Mixed trend for Indian counters

India-dedicated funds outperform domestic peers

`Chances of finding multi-baggers are never ruled out completely'

Sideways movement likely to continue