The Hindu Business Line : Frontline stocks see bear onslaught

Tuesday's trading session was a bloodbath, with the advances-declines ratio at about 7:12 in favour of the losers. Frontline stocks took most of the beating, with the Sensex dropping by about 2.5 per cent against one per cent drop in the small-cap and mid-cap indices on the BSE.

In the first hour, negative sentiment surrounding the crash in the Thailand stock exchange was kept at bay. However, with other Asian markets catching the flu, bears went on a roll before noon. Though the domestic markets shed about 2.5 per cent they were better off than many of their Asian cousins.

Buzzing Stocks

Click here for table

Select stocks in the pharmaceuticals space attracted considerable buying interest. Prominent among them were IPCA Labs and Panacea Biotech. Birla Ericsson, Bharati Shipyard, Flex Industries, Orient Abrasives and Ponni Sugars also were in the limelight.

Sector Watch

The capital goods sector took a heavy beating from the bears. With advances-declines ratio lopsided in favour of the losers, the capital goods index on the BSE shed more than three per cent.

Frontline stocks were among the top losers in this space. Crompton Greaves, BHEL, L&T, Bharat Electronics and BEML shed more than three per cent.

ABB, Greaves Cotton, Siemens, Kirloskar Brothers and Bharat Bijlee too closed in the red. Gammon India, Thermax and Alstom Projects were among the few that bucked the trend.

The IT sector also cornered attention from the bears with Infosys, Wipro, Satyam, HCL Technologies and TCS closing in the red. The heavyweights featured among the top losers in the IT space. Other losers included Financial Technologies, Hexaware, Tech Mahindra, Geometric Software, i-flex Solutions and NIIT Technologies.

Selling pressure continued in the metals sector with all the constituents of the sector-oriented index on the BSE closing in the red. Stocks of all hues and colours were subject to negative sentiment.

Jindal Steel, Tata Steel, Jindal SAW, JSW and Ispat Industries were among the top losers in the steel space. Sesa Goa was also subject to bear hammering, with the stock touching an intra-day low of Rs 1,171.

Hindustan Zinc appeared to have been affected by dipping zinc prices in the global markets. Other top losers in the non-ferrous space included Hindalco, National Aluminium and Sterlite Industries.

On a day when the markets were subject to bearish sentiment, the sugar sector was spared, as the markets reacted positively to the Government's decision to review the ban on sugar exports.

On Monday, the Cabinet had relaxed the norm on exports by sugar manufacturers to meet their obligations on import of raw sugar. South-based sugar manufacturers such as KCP Sugar, Sakthi Sugars, Rajshree Sugars and Thiru Arooran closed in the green.

North-based sugar manufacturers, which are less reliant on imports of raw sugar, also ramped up commendable gains. Triveni Engineering, Balrampur Chini and Dhampur Sugar gained four per cent. Dropping by one per cent, EID Parry bucked the trend.

Other gainers/losers

Top gainers among the Junior Nifty constituents were Asian Paints, Apollo Tyres, Chennai Petroleum, IBP, Pfizer and Union Bank. Losers included IDBI, Mphasis BFL, Bank of India, Canara Bank, IFCI, Bharat Forge, Aurobindo Pharma and Polaris.