The IT index, up nearly five per cent, was the top performing index on the Indian bourses on Tuesday. Gains in the sector were led by the surge in stocks such as TCS and Wipro, up 13 per cent and five per cent respectively.
A day after its quarterly results, TCS closed at Rs 1,195, up 13 per cent from its previous close on the BSE. Owing to TCS' good results, many brokerages such as Angel Broking and Kotak Securities ascribed a ‘buy' status to the stock.
“The star of the day was TCS which gained 12 per cent after the management was confident that it will beat Nassom's industry growth target of 11-14 per cent for FY13. Wipro and Infosys also saw strong buying action,” said Mr Milan Bavishi, Head Research, Inventure Growth and Securities.
Wipro closed at Rs 442.20, up 4.41 per cent and Infosys closed at Rs 2,348.55, up two per cent from its previous close on the BSE. HCL Technologies closed higher by three per cent at Rs 510.25.
“The market was largely held up by the IT sector stocks.
“If you remove the effect of the IT stock, the market did not really do well,” said Mr Gaurav Dua, Head of Research, Sharekhan.
Contrarian
In stark contrast to the IT stocks, was the poor performance of telecom stocks. “Telecom shares witnessed selling pressure on reports of telecom regulator suggesting a base auction price of 2G spectrum much higher than the previously allotted price by the government,” said Ms Shanu Goel, Senior Research Analyst, Bonanza Portfolio. Idea Cellular closed at Rs 80.15, down 3,72 per cent on the BSE.
Bharti Airtel, Reliance Communication and MTNL were also down by two per cent, 1.35 per cent and 1.7 per cent respectively.
priya.s@thehindu.co.in