Market slips into the red after firm start

The market opened on a firm note extending last week's rally. It soon declined into the red, amid mixed Asian markets. Banking and auto stocks rose ahead of Reserve Bank of India’s annual monetary policy review tomorrow 29 April 2008. Metal stocks were mixed following reports the government plans to rejig the duty structure to rein in surging steel prices. The market breadth was positive.




At 10:22 IST, the 30-share BSE Sensex was down 37.80 points or 0.23% at 17,086.17. Sensex hit a high of 17,271.56 in early trade. At the day’s high, Sensex rose 145.58 points. It soon declined to hit a low of 17,042.97. At day’s low sensex fell 83.01 points in early trade.

The broader based S&P CNX Nifty was down 6.85 points or 0.13% at 5,104.85.

The market breadth was positive on BSE with 921 shares advancing as compared to 716 that declined. 45 remained unchanged.

The BSE Mid-Cap index rose 0.24% to 7073.30 and BSE Small-Cap index rose 0.29% to 8,752.89.




Banking stocks rose. India’s largest private sector bank by assets ICICI Bank rose 0.74% to Rs 924.90. ICICI Bank reported 39.4% rise in net profit to Rs 1149.84 crore on 22.3% increase in operating income to Rs 10390.92 crore in Q4 March 2008 over Q4 March 2007. India’s second largest private sector bank in terms of net profit HDFC Bank rose 0.79% to Rs 1509.90. However India’s largest commercial bank State Bank of India declined 0.98% to Rs 1,732.90.

Auto Stocks edged higher. India’s largest tractor maker by sales Mahindra & Mahindra rose 0.38% to Rs 638.15. The board of Mahindra & Mahindra will meet on Saturday, 3 May 2008 to consider a proposal for a private placement of securities. Maruti Suzuki India (up 0.5% to Rs 740.90), Hero Honda Motors (up 1.37% to Rs 818.40) edged higher.




India' s largest truck maker by sales Tata Motors declined 0.25% to Rs 637.50.

Metal stocks were mixed. Sesa Goa surged 8.34% to Rs 3,791.85. The board of Sesa Goa will meet today, 28 April 2008 to consider a stock split and bonus share issue. Sterlite Industries (up 4.08% to Rs 871.30), Steel Authority of India (up 1.44% to Rs 180) edged higher. But Tata Steel (down 0.64% to Rs 798.15), Hindalco Industries (down 0.56% to Rs 187.95) and National Aluminium Company (down 0.52% to Rs 444) edged lower.




Reportedly, the government is planning duty rejig to cool steel prices. Government is set to remove import duty on pig iron, mild steel, metcoke and levy 10% export duty on bars, rods, HR coils, HR sheets, HSM plates, CR coils, CR sheets, galvanised steel products, pipes and tubes. Besides, export duty of 10% is likely to be imposed on semi-finished products like pig iron, sponge iron, steel and iron scraps, reports suggest.

Bharti Airtel (up 1.99% to Rs 943.70), HDFC (up 0.78% to Rs 2,714.90), NTPC (up 0.39% to Rs 193.35) edged higher from Sensex pack.




Wipro (down 1.33% to Rs 460), Infosys (down 1.03% to Rs 1,669.05), Satyam Computer Services (down 0.55% to Rs 442) and Tata Consultancy Services (down 0.82% to Rs 882.50) edged lower from Sensex pack.

Satra Properties India rose 1.2% to Rs 84. The board of Satra Properties India has approved investing up to Rs 5 crore in a real estate partnership firm.

Fedders Lloyd Corporation rose 3.23% to Rs 64 after its board approved diversification into steel fabrication, design and erection and expansion of business activities of the company in the area of district cooling.




India Infoline rose 0.44% to Rs 992.The board of India Infoline approved splitting each share of Rs 10 each into five shares of Rs 2 each. Further, the board also recommended a dividend of Rs 6 per share of Rs 10 each.