The Hindu Business Line : Essar Oil, Ispat Ind in limelight

Chennai, Dec. 18 Even though the Nifty spot closed down by 0.60 per cent, the Nifty futures ended on a flat note at 5778.95 and in premium of about 36.65 points with respect to the spot close.

This is quite interesting as the December contracts are expiring on next Thursday with two trading days — Friday and next Tuesday — being holidays. The premium was in the range of 25-40 points during most part of the day. The premium was mainly due to short covering of open positions.

Rollover of open interest positions on Nifty futures to January series is 18 per cent. The Nifty January future closed at 5769.05, with a premium of 26.75 points.

Turnover improved in the F&O segment to Rs 74,579 crore against Monday’s figure of Rs 73,373 crore. Option segment at Rs 8,139 crore continued to witness heightened activity, which indicates a volatile trading pattern in the market.

Stock futures

Reliance-pack – RNRL, Reliance Industries, Reliance Energy, Reliance Capital and Reliance Petroleum – were the top 5 active counters. Apart from them, Triveni Engineering, IFCI, Essar Oil, Jindal Steel and Ispat Industries were the other active counters. Among them, Essar Oil and Ispat Industries were the star performers with the former gaining 10.41 per cent and the latter by 5.41 per cent.

While Essar Oil shed 8.4 per cent open interest positions, Ispat Industries saw accumulation of open interest positions by 3.5 per cent. Both the counters, however, ended in premium to the spot close.

On the other hand, IFCI was the biggest loser with the counter losing 7 per cent; it also shed 14.7 per cent open interest positions indicating nervousness of the market. The IFCI December future ended in premium of Re 1 with respect to the spot close.

FIIs selling spree

Foreign institutional investors maintained their selling spree in the F&O segment; they were net sellers to the tune of Rs 2,195 crore. Though there were buyers of Rs 355.82 crore on index options, they have offloaded Rs 2,042.38 crore on index futures and Rs 509.25 crore on stock futures.

Securities under ban

The NSE has banned Alok Textiles, Aptech, Essar Oil, Gitanjali Gems, IFCI, Nagarjuna Fertilizers and PowerGrid as open interest positions have crossed the stipulated 95 per cent of market-wide position.

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