Sensex completes four-week losing streak, down 4.26%

The stock markets lost lustre for the fourth week in a row on sustained selling as investors opted to book profits rather than making fresh commitments on slew of negative factors during the week under review. Fall in GDP growth, rise in inflation, sluggish global markets, a feeble response to the IPOs and fears of recession in the US took its toll on share values, brokers said.

The Bombay Stock Exchange 30-share (BSE) barometer continued to display volatile movements with downward bias and moved in a wide range of 18,895.34 and 17,203.06 before ending the week at 17,464.89, a steep fall of 777.69 points or 4.26 per cent over last weekend’s close of 18,242.58.

The Sensex had lost 3,362.56 points or 16.14 per cent in last four weeks, and is down by a whopping 3,741.88 points or 17.64 per cent from a record high of 21,206.77 registered on January 10. Similarly, the broad-based S&P CNX Nifty of the National Stock Exchange (NSE) also tumbled by 196.90 points or 3.70 per cent to finish the week at 5,120.35 from preceding weekend’s close of 5,317.25.

Marketmen attributed initial firmness to expectations of increase in liquidity as investors started investing the refund money from Reliance Power IPO, which had received unprecedented response, back into the stock markets. But projection of a moderation in GDP growth from 9.6 % last fiscal to 8.7 % this year forced cautious operators to book profits even at current lower levels.

In the US, reports of weak services sector and tightening of lending standards by banks once again stoked recession fears. Comments by a Fed official about possible recession only added fuel to fire and impacted negatively on the global markets.

Depressing secondary markets weighed on the primary markets as after pulling out IPO by Wockhardt Hospitals on February 7, the West Asia’s largest property developer Emmar MGF Land also withdrew its IPO on February 8, giving wrong signals to the investors.

Anil Dhirubhai Ambani Group company, Reliance Power is going to be listed on the local bourses on Monday, January 11, and all eyes are now set on that. During the week, the trading volume on the BSE improved to Rs 30,332 crore from last week’s turnover of Rs 23,539 crore, while declined on the NSE to Rs 67,660 crore from Rs 68,828 crore.

The broad-based BSE-100 index slumped by 387.78 points or 4.00 % to end the week at 9,296.78 from last weekend’s close of 9,684.50. The BSE-200 index and the Dollex-200 were quoted sharply lower at 2,196.12 and 922.61 at the weekend compared to previous weekend’s close of 2,280.37 and 965.07 respectively.

The BSE-500 index also dropped by 254.75 points to end the week at 7,047.60 from preceding weekend’s close of 7,302.35 and the Dollex-30 ended the week sharply lower at 3,618.13 from 3,807.10 last weekend.

On the NSE, the S&P CNX Defty plunged by 205.80 points or 4.40 % to finish the week at 4,476.35 from previous weekend’s close of 4,682.15 and the S&P CNX Nifty Junior dipped by 478.75 points to 9,740.60 from 10,219.35 last weekend.