Markets post weekly gains

Good quarterly results, FII buying keep sentiments buoyant

Profit-booking during the end of the week due to comments from RBI Governor Raghuram Rajan about high inflation and interest rates notwithstanding, the S&P BSE Sensex finished the week at 21,133.56, up 70 points. 

The week saw the 30-scrip Sensex reach an all-time closing peak of 21,373.66 on January 23, 2014 while the Nifty registered its second biggest closing of 6,345.65 points on the same day.

Good corporate results from some key companies coupled with sustained foreign capital inflows kept market tempo upbeat for second straight week.

Shares of companies in information technology, banking and consumer durable sectors firmed up on good buying enquiries while refinery, realty and power counters met with strong resistance at higher levels.The sensex resumed higher on rise in IT stocks after Wipro announced encouraging third quarter earnings. Wipro announced a 27 per cent rise in consolidated net profit for the third quarter.

Foreign Institutional Investors continued their buying during the week by investing net Rs 943.34 crores as per Sebi data including the provisional figure of January 24.However, the second rank counters underperformed the index, mainly due to profit-booking by wary retail investors at higher levels. 

The BSE-Midcap and Smallcap indices closed down by 0.49 per cent and 0.50 per cent respectively.

Head Of Research at Veracity Broking Services Jignesh Chaudhary, said, “Indian equity markets traded from positive to range bound the better part of the week, before shedding most of its gain on the last trading day of the week. There were some good rallies seen in the Banking, IT and Pharma stocks during the week.”

"In the absence of any fresh triggers during the week to drive some cues on either side, markets traded cautiously and is now keenly waiting RBI policy decision on interest rates due on Tuesday, 28th of January 2014," he added.

Major gainers were Axis Bank 4.72 per cent, Wipro 3.56 per cent, Hindalco 2.33 per cent, ICICI Bank 2.23 per cent, Sun Pharma 1.62 per cent, TCS 1.24 per cent and SSLT 1 per cent. 

However, Coal India dropped by 5.44 per cent, BHEL 3.97 per cent, Tata Power 3.13 per cent, RIL 1.98 per cent, Hero Honda 1.58 per cent, M&M 1.48 per cent and ONGC 1.43 per cent.

Among the S&P BSE sectoral indices, IT firmed up by 1.43 per cent, teck 1.35 per cent and bankex 0.60 per cent while Oil&Gas 1.47 per cent, Realty 1.46 per cent, power 1.36 per cent and auto 0.62 per cent.