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Posted by Levasto India
Chidambaram's promises keep market tempo upbeat
Mumbai: Finance minister P. Chidambaram’s promise to shortly reveal a path of fiscal consolidation to regain investor confidence kept the market tempo upbeat for the second week in a row
Investors were enthused by comments made by Chidambaram to unveil a broad roadmap to regain investor confidence and the government will work with the RBI to moderate inflation.
Brokers also said the trading mood improved on global cues influenced by higher-than-forecast US jobs data at 163,000 for July that came out after Indian markets closed on August 3.
The BSE 30-share gauge resumed the week higher and improved further to an intra-trade at four-and-a-half-month high of 17,726.64 on Wednesday, levels not seen since March 16, 2012 when it had logged a high of 17,871.00.
However, it could not sustain the gains due to a decline in the country's industrial production announced on Thursday and a steep fall in telecom giant Bharti Airtel on dismal Q1 performance and also in SBI due to rise in non-performing assets (NPAs) respectively.
Share values of Bharti Airtel was the top loser from the Sensex pack with a fall of 13.73 per cent after its profit dropped 37 per cent in April-June quarter, the tenth decline in quarterly profit. SBI was the second with a decline of 5.86 per cent, which restricted the rise in the Sensex, otherwise the gain would have been much more pronounced.
Auto, IT, metal, FMCG and refinery stocks were at the forefront, while some of the consumer durable and realty stocks were down on profit-booking.
Buying was seen in some of the key frontline stocks such as M&M, Tata Motors, Bajaj Auto, Maruti Suzuki, TCS, Infosys, Sterlite Ind, Hindalco, Jindal Steel, HUL, ITC, RIL, GAIL, L&T, NTPC and Tata Power, while second-line stocks underperformed the Sensex, indicating lack of interest from retail investors as the current unstable scenario.
