Mkts sell-off on weak global cues, B'lore blast

Weak global cues dented investor sentiment and the indices traded negative through the session. The Nifty fell 122 points to close at 4,311, while the Sensex plummeted 500 points to close below the 14,300 mark.

Despite the day's fall, the markets clocked impressive gains for the week, while the Sensex shot up by close to 5%.

There was quite a significant knock coming in on the market. We were not expecting the cut to be so severe. Trade particularly went down because of national issues and the blast in Bangalore also had its impact in the last hour of trade.

3.5% down at closing bell was how we closed Sensex at 14,270. The picture is pretty much the same for the Nifty as well down about 2.5% is how we wrapped up the trade on that index.

Asian markets from the start of trade this morning were not looking too great. In each one of those markets, the cut has been 1-2%. On the broader indices, the performance was one of the relative strength at least in the midcap and the smallcap index. The Nifty Junior was however down 2% and in excess to that before recovering to close down nearly about 1.8%. On the advance decline front, the picture is pretty much reflected as not so bad given the fact that we were looking at extreme amount of sell off in the benchmark indices.

FMCG held out because of HUL. ICICI was down 10% ahead of numbers. That stock did not trade and close very well in today’s session. Reliance’s numbers came out pretty much inline with estimates. There was a fair amount of selling pressure seen in capital good stocks. Some of the numbers were disappointing and the market punished the stock.

BHEL was also down 4% and L&T followed. Unitech and DLF both closed session with very significant losses. We also had a fair amount of selling pressure come in the universe of stocks. But HUL is the one that held out; 2.5% with almost 40 lakh shares with numbers, which are very strong. Grasim was another stock which came out with a good set of numbers. It continues to rule about 2.5% higher. Ambuja Cement in today’s session did not do too badly in the initial flash but went down a little bit. The liquid universe was not any better. There were significant price cuts on the back of high volumes. There was some buying interest seen in the sugar space.

It was a very disappointing session considering the fact that it started off on a pretty heavy note. Through the middle of the week also there was some excitement built but it seems short-lived for now.