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C. Raja Rajeshwari

THE benchmark indices surged to close with gains, in spite of the US-Iraq war started on Thursday. The BSE Sensex rose 71.75 points to close at 3192.9 points as compared to Wednesday's close of 3121.2. The Sensex gained 3.5 per cent in the past two trading days. During Thursday's trading session, the Sensex saw an intra-day high of 3197.6 and a low of 3118.3. The Nifty appreciated 21.35 points to end at 1025.25 points. With expectations of a short war, selective buying interest was witnessed on Thursday.

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Tech stocks and PSU's revved up the indices to higher levels. Among the Sensex stocks, Dr. Reddy, Ranbaxy, Bajaj Auto, Hero Honda and Tata Engg appreciated whereas Cipla, ITC, HDFC, BSES and Nestle slid into negative territory. Traded volumes on the BSE rose 34 per cent to 8.2 crore share as compared to Wednesday's 6.1 crore shares. Gainers pipped losers, with 752 stocks gaining and 499 stocks losing value.

Trends in the futures & options market were in line with the cash market. Traded volumes in Nifty futures increased by 30 per cent. The near-month Nifty future contract was actively traded closing 17.60 points higher at 1021.8. Apart from the June Nifty contracts, the April and May Nifty future contracts were quoting at a discount to the spot.

Tech stocks, which had been losing last week on the uncertainty of war, reversed trend to gain this week. Stocks such as Infosys, Satyam, Digital, Wipro, i-flex Solutions, Mastek and Polaris gained due to buying at lower levels on hopes that the business prospects may improve for these stocks after the war gets over.

Satyam Computer rose 5.87 per cent to close at Rs 205.70; Infosys Technologies appreciated by 4.51 per cent to end at Rs 4,378.85; and HCL Technologies ended higher by 4.55 per cent at Rs 160.75. The notable gainer was Polaris, which closed higher by 10.4 per cent; e-Serve International was, however, a loser declining by 1.5 per cent.

Auto stocks rode into positive territory with buying interest. Hero Honda gained 5.7 per cent to close at Rs 229, Tata Engg appreciated 4.18 per cent to Rs 159.4 and Bajaj Auto closed higher at 3.1 per cent at Rs 499.10

Banking on short war expectations, banking stocks shone with buying interest. Canara Bank appreciated 6.25 per cent to Rs 67.10 with over 26.46 lakh shares traded on the BSE. Other public sector bank stocks such as Union Bank of India rose 5.05 per cent, Bank of Baroda closed higher by 4.05 per cent, Bank of India ended up by 3.24 per cent on renewed buying support.

HDFC, which was on downtrend this week, closed lower on Thursday by 1.2 per cent at Rs 351.8. However, notable gainers among financial institutions were IDBI (1.2 per cent), IFCI (2.4 per cent), Reliance Capital (2.6 per cent) and Kotak Mahindra (1.2 per cent)

With news that Joint Investments, a private company, has acquired 27.21 per cent stake in Goetze India from Escorts, the latter's stock inched up 0.5 per cent whereas Goetze India closed down by 1.4 per cent.

With the shareholders of Parke Davis challenging the merger with Pfizer and procuring a stay order on the merger, the latter's stock was down by one per cent whereas Parke Davis increased marginally by 0.4 per cent. With Ranbaxy getting approval from the USFDA to market two drugs in the US, the stock rose 5.8 per cent to close at Rs 617.30. Other domestic pharma stocks that witnessed buying activity were Dr. Reddy's (higher by two per cent) and Sun Pharma (rose by one per cent). However, Cipla and Wockhardt closed with marginal losses.

Among other stocks, notable gainers were Lakshmi Mills, Ramco Systems, MRF, Moser Baer, Divi Labs and MphasiS BFL. Some notable losers were FAG Bearings, NRB Bearings, ONGC, BSES, Tata Investments and Bayer India.

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