New lows for Sensex,Nifty; Nifty below 3000 first Since July 2006

Market fails to hold; Nifty ends below 3000
Sensex tumbles below 10K
Markets tumble; Sensex ends below 9,800pts

Equities failed to sustain the recovery midway through on Thursday’s trade after SEBI asked foreign funds to cover their short sales and ended with huge losses Thursday.

The rebound was set off by short covering and supported by a sharp drop in inflation. However, the mounting negative sentiments across the global markets, meltdown in commodities and proved too strong to ignore. Indices opened with a sharp cut of over 5 per cent, in line with fall in global markets. The fall was led by metal scrips which were under pressure due to steep correction in international commodities prices. But bargain buying at lower levels helped recover partial losses. India’s annual inflation rate eased to 11.07 per cent in the week to Oct 11 from 11.44 per cent a week earlier. But the real trigger came after Finance Minister P Chidambaram said SEBI had directed foreign institutional investors to reverse their short sales. “SEBI has told them (FIIs) that it disapproves of lending to offshore entities, and asked them to reverse those transactions. I am told that those transactions are likely to be reversed over the next few days,” the minister said. This led to a strong recovery in the markets and the indices, which were down more than 3 per cent, soon made it to positive territory. But the euphoria didn’t last long and all the gains were wiped off.

Bombay Stock Exchange’s Sensex closed at 9,771.70, down 398.20 points or 3.92 per cent from Wednesday’s close. It touched a low of 9,681.28 and high of 10,260.55 intraday. National Stock Exchange’s Nifty ended at 2,951 down 3.98 per cent or 122 points. The index touched a high of 3,085.10 and a low of 2,917.15.

Second rung stocks were not spared either. BSE Midcap Index closed 3.2 per cent lower and BSE Smallcap Index declined 3.55 per cent.

“There is no word on restoring of short positions by the SEBI, except for their disapproval. If it indeed imposes a ban on short-selling by FIIs, there would be some sort of short covering. Our market is under pressure because there is selling all over the world. Eventually, a particular stock or the market as a whole would be evaluated on its fundamentals,” said Manish Sonthalia, vice president, equity research at Motilal Oswal. Rahul Sanghvi, Institutional Sales, Kantilal Chaganlal Securities, said, “FIIs can sell anything they have to but should avoid stock borrowing and lending practice outside the Indian jurisdiction. The fight between bulls and bears must be within the boxing ring. Investor confidence needs to be propped up and SEBI should publish more elaborate data on P-notes lending and borrowing activity.” India’s oil major, Reliance Industries posted 7.42 per cent rise in net profit of Rs 4,122 crore for the quarter ended Sep 30, 2008 compared to Rs 3837 crore in the same quarter previous year, beating analyst forecasts, helped by stronger than expected refining margins. Total income increased to Rs 44,938 crore in the September quarter from Rs 32,211 crore a year ago. The company’s refining margins for the quarter were $13.4 a barrel television news channels reported, well above the benchmark Asian Dubai crack margin, which averaged about $5.8 a barrel in the period. Shares of Reliance Industries slumped 7.62 per cent to close at Rs 1215.25 in a weak market. Grasim Industries (4.74%), BHEL (2.74%), ONGC (1.94%), Larsen & Toubro (2.43%) HDFC Bank (2.23%) and TCS (0.2%) ended higher. Tata Steel (-14.85%) suffered the sharpest cut. Losses in Tata Motors (-14.57%), Hindalco Industries (-13.10%), Ranbaxy Laboratories (-10.94%) and Mahindra & Mahindra (-9.77%) pulled down the indices. The four-day slide in metals gathered pace on recession fears. Copper and aluminium tumbled to their lowest in almost three years on Wednesday. Gloomy demand prospects and gains in the dollar to a two-year high have knocked commodities, many of which have collapsed since hitting record highs earlier this year, which in turn, dragged down the entire metal pack. BSE Metal Index closed 11.08 per cent lower. Market breadth on BSE was extremely weak, with 1908 declines and 622 advances.

Source:ET,SIfy. ,BS