Post session - Quick review

Indian equity markets went through a roller coaster ride on the settlement day of March F&O series as the benchmark indices gyrating in and out of the green zone finally settled in the favour of red with a cut of over half a percentage point.  Volatility coupled with position squaring remained the focus of the session on account of portfolio positioning by domestic institutional investors ahead of the fiscal year-end this week and also on last settlement day of F&O series for the financial year 2011-12. High volume day of trade with a turnover of Rs 2 lack crore, however witnessed substantial recovery in the wee hours of trade, which pushed the barometer gauges out of the intra-day’s  low, reclaiming their crucial bastions. March F&O series, being the first negative series since November 2011, saw the benchmark index of Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE)-Sensex and National Stock Exchange (NSE)-Nifty, losing around 6% each.

Protracting previous session’s southbound journey, market men this session pocketed profits in light of apprehension over the adoption of the new tax norms `General Anti-Avoidance Rules` and the weakening rupee amid month-end demand for the dollar from oil importers, which besides fleeing foreign institutional investors, also demoralized sentiment back home.

Shifting their focus to the Reserve Bank of India's policy review meet and corporate earnings for direction, trader’s lacking any positive triggers, pressed sales in major counters, thereby validating the bearish sentiment of the markets. However, lack of positive trade from global front, too failed to activate bulls.

On the global front, Asian shares eased for a second day in a row on Thursday, as investors limited their risk exposures on concerns about growth prospects in the world's two largest economies, the United States and China, after US durable-goods orders and earnings trailed estimates. In the US, a key export market for Asia, the Commerce Department reported durable goods orders increased 2.2% in February, not enough to fully reverse January's revised 3.6% decline.

Meanwhile, European stocks, tracking losses on Wall Street and Asia lost further ground for the third day in a row. Mounting concerns over slowdown in global growth following a raft of lower-than-expected US macro data spooked sentiment.

Back home, recovery in the stocks from Consumer Durable (CD), Health Care (HC), Auto and Realty, led to minimize losses of Sensex. On the flip side, stocks from Capital Goods, Information Technology and TECk counters confirmed weakness. The BSE’s Sensex after dipping sub 17000 crucial mark, recuperated in the dying hours of trade, only end to above the crucial bastion. Similarly, the NSE’s Nifty too losing 5150 bastion reclaimed the level towards the fag end of the trade. The broader indices, however, bucking trend, went home with prominent gains. The market breadth on the BSE ended positive; advances and declining stocks were in a ratio of 1534:1265 while 110 scrips remained unchanged. (Provisional)

The BSE Sensex lost 62.78 points or 0.37% and settled at 17,058.84. The index touched a high and a low of 17,098.17 and 16,920.61 respectively. 14 stocks advanced against 16 declining ones on the index (Provisional)

The BSE Mid-cap index gained 0.14% while Small-cap index was up 0.72%. (Provisional)

On the BSE Sectoral front, Consumer Durables up 1.08%, Health Care up 0.94%, Auto up 0.78%, Realty up 0.53% and Metal up 0.33%were the only gainers while Capital Goods down 1.75%, IT down 1.39%, TECk down 1.15%, FMCG down 0.39% and Bankex down 0.33% were the top losers.

There top gainers on the Sensex were Jindal Steel up 4.08%, Hero MotoCorp up 1.90%, Tata Power up 1.89%, Maruti Suzuki up 1.51% and Bajaj Auto up 1.41% while, Infosys down 2.10%, L&T down 2.09%, TCS down 1.77%, BHEL down 1.76% and SBI down 0.99% were the top losers in the index. (Provisional)

Meanwhile, Public sector companies again dominated the ninth round of oil and gas acreages auction. ONGC got operating rights for four blocks, while a consortium led by Oil India won two blocks. Gail India led a consortium that was awarded one onshore block in the Cambay basin.

Under the ninth bid round of New Exploration Licensing Policy (NELP-IX), the government had received bids for 33 blocks out of 34 offered. Though private sector companies like Reliance Industries and Cairn India had put in their bids but they were unable to cash in.

Other companies awarded blocks in the ninth round were Sankalp Oil and Natural Resources, which won three, while one block each was won by Focus Energy, Pratibha Oil and Natural Gas, Pan India Consultants & Frost International, and Deep Energy, a subsidiary of Deep Industries which is based in the United States, in a consortium with other companies has got operatorship of three onshore blocks.

The winning of a majority of blocks by PSUs is not surprising as the process saw little participation from foreign companies. India is the world's fourth-largest oil importer and ships in 80% of its oil needs. Given the increasing demand for energy in the country, the government has been trying to woo foreign players. However foreign companies have been shying away from the Indian markets due to its poor track record of commercial discoveries and sluggish bureaucracy. The previous two licensing rounds were also dominated by Indian state-run firms.

On the 10th round of auction, Oil Minister Jaipal Reddy said, India will continue auctioning oil and gas blocks but won't switch to a new process of accepting bids for exploratory blocks at any time due to data-related issues. Unless we have a national data repository, we can't go in for open-acreage licensing. By adding more he said, ‘we want to go in for the 10th round as quickly as possible.’  India VIX, a gauge for market’s short term expectation of volatility lost 2.17% at 24.33 from its previous close of 24.87 on Wednesday. (Provisional)

The S&P CNX Nifty lost 16.85 points or 0.32% to settle at 5,177.90. The index touched high and low of 5,194.30 and 5,135.95 respectively. 24 stocks advanced against 26 declining ones on the index. (Provisional)

The top gainers on the Nifty were Ranbaxy up 6.63%, Jindal Steel up 3.61%, BPCL up 3.37%, Hero MotoCorp up 2.40% and JP Associates up 2.14%.On the other hand, Siemens down 3.91%, Reliance Communications down 2.49%, L&T down 2.28%, Infosys down 2.12% and TCS down 2.07% were the top losers. (Provisional)

The European markets were trading in red, with France's CAC 40 down 1.09%, Germany's DAX down 0.97% and Britain’s FTSE 100 down 0.82%.

Sentiments remained bearish for second straight session in the Asian region and most of the equity indices snapped the day’s trade in the red on Thursday as weak economic data from United States and Britain stoked worries about the global economy health. Earlier, the Asian counters made a choppy start followed a fall on Wall Street after figures from the US Commerce Department showed a slower-than-expected rise in new orders for manufactured durable goods, that came after an index of US consumer confidence on March 27, 2012 showed a slip, while home prices continued to fall in January. Moreover, Official data in Britain showed that the country's economy shrank a revised 0.3 percent in the final three months of 2011, worse than the 0.2 percent drop previously estimated.

Tokyo shares fell 0.67 percent as energy plays were hurt by talk among Western powers on releasing oil reserves to damp rising prices while, Seoul shares fell to a near three-week closing low, weighed down by program trading as offshore investors sold futures. Further, Hong Kong and China shares extended losses ending with a cut of about one and a half percent, led by banks and energy stocks, as weak corporate results underscored fears that the slowdown in China is hurting profitability more than expected.