At 10:28 IST, the 30-share BSE Sensex was up 30.48 points or 0.18% at 16,783.34. It opened 61.56 points lower at 16,691.30 and slipped further to touch a low of 16,626.35 in early trade. At the day’s low, Sensex lost 126.51 points. Sensex rose 40.05 points at day’s high of 16,792.91 hit in early trade
The broader based S&P CNX Nifty was down 5.70 points or 0.11% at 4,952.10
The market breadth was positive on BSE with 943 shares advancing as compared to 681 that declined. 56 remained unchanged.
Among the 30-member Sensex pack, 16 advanced while the rest slipped.
Oil & Natural Gas Corporation, the country’s largest state run oil exploration company in terms of sales, slumped 3.02% to Rs 967. It was the top loser from Sensex pack
India’s largest private sector company in terms of market capitalisation and oil refiner Reliance Industries (RIL) was down 0.39% to Rs 2491.80.
Reliance Infrastructure (down 1.32% to Rs 1363), NTPC (down 2.34% to Rs 187.80), and HDFC Bank (down 1.73% to Rs 1456.60), were the other losers from Sensex pack.
Bharti Airtel, the country’s top cellular services provider in terms of market capitalisation advanced 1.55% to Rs 834. It was the top gainer from Sensex pack. Bharti Airtel on Tuesday, 13 May 2008, said its talks for South Africa's MTN were still exploratory and it has not made any bid.
The Asian Wall Street Journal said on Monday, 12 May 2008, that Bharti was considering raising its offer to around 175 South African rand ($22.84) a share for control of MTN. It said an official bid could come this week. MTN's market value has risen to $38.8 billion, after an 8.8% increase in its share prices since 2 May 2008, the trading day before the company said it was in talks with Bharti.
DLF (up 0.81% to Rs 620), Hindalco Industries (up 1.17% to Rs 182.05), and Mahindra & Mahindra (up 1.03% to Rs 673.60), were the other gainers from Sensex pack
Shares of oil marketing firms were subdued following reports that the Union government will issue bonds worth Rs 15000 crore to state oil refiners for the quarter ended on March 2008. Hindustan Petroleum Corporation (down 0.64% to Rs 233.50), Bharat Petroleum Corporation (down 1.58% to Rs 343), and Indian Oil Corporation (down 2.72% to Rs 407), declined.
The oil bonds will be issued to oil marketing firms so as to compensate half the revenue loss incurred for selling fuel at state-set low prices. During 2006/07, the government had compensated 42.7% of the revenue losses of state oil refiners.
Lloyd Electric & Engineering rose 3.13% to Rs 117 at 10:03 IST on BSE after it announced acquisition of Luvata Czech s.r.o. in Prague, Czech republic through its special purpose vehicle Lioyd Coils Czech s.r.o. The company made this announcement before market hours today, 14 May 2008.
Asian markets were trading mixed today, 14 May 2008. Sanghai Composite (up 1.76% at 3,623.03), Taiwan Weighted (up 0.20% at 9,007.64), advanced. However, Hang Seng (down 1.37% at 25,203.86), Nikkei 225 Average (up 0.39% at 13,951.53), Straits Times (down 0.71% at 3,180.63) and Seoul Composite (down 0.56% at 1,832.42) edged lower.
US markets settled mixed yesterday, 13 May 2008 as investors juggled a mixed bag of news. A tepid outlook from Yahoo, HP's bid for EDS and a surprising resilience in retail sales led to mixed reactions. The Dow Jones fell 44.13 points, or 0.34%, to 12,832.18. The Nasdaq Composite index rose 6.63 points, or 0.27%, to 2,495.12.
On 13 May 2008, Indian equities reversed early gains in choppy trade to settle lower closely mirroring European markets. The 30-share BSE Sensex slipped 108.04 points or 0.64% at 16,752.86 and the broader based S&P CNX Nifty shed 54.85 points or 1.09% at 4,957.80, on that day.
As per provisional data, foreign funds purchased shares worth a net Rs 73.93 crore yesterday, 13 May 2008. Domestic funds bought shares worth a net Rs 266.50 crore on that day.
Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) were net buyers of Rs 617.15 crore in the futures & options segment yesterday, 13 May 2008. They were net buyers of index futures to the tune of Rs 658.33 crore and sold index options worth Rs 41.12 crore. They were net buyers of stock futures to the tune of Rs 3.90 crore and sold stock options worth Rs 3.96 crore.
US light crude for June delivery was down 1 cent at $125.79 a barrel today, 14 May 2008, with traders awaiting an expected rebound in weekly US distillate stocks and still on edge over the previous day's report that Iran was considering a proposal to cut output. It had surged to record high of $126.98 a barrel yesterday, 13 May 2008.
Meanwhile, the board of the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) in its meeting held yesterday, 13 May 2008, gave an in principle approval to the concept of marking lien on bank account as an alternative mode of payment in public and rights issues. The concept will enable the application money to remain in the bank account of the applicant till such time the allotment is finalized and thus eliminate the refund process.