Markets drop on global cues

Shares of Oil marketing companies, ONGC and ADAG-group stood tall in an otherwise weak markets. Banks, metal and IT stocks bore the brunt of the selling today as the Sensex, the Nifty, fell in tandem with the world markets.

The markets opened soft on the back of weak Asian cues. The Sensex dropped in early trades on weakness in banking and metal stocks. However, around noon markets started recovering. The recovery, led by healthcare stocks was short lived and the index turned volatile again.

The Sensex plunged in the last few minutes of trade as selling intensified in banking and metal stocks. The index touched a low of 17,547 - down 168 points from the day's high.

The Sensex finally ended down 156 points at 17,575. The Nifty ended with a loss of 52 points at 5,269.

Global markets were weak today. In Asia, the Nikkei slumped 2% to 9,737. Taiwan Weighted was down 1.5% at 7,474. Europe, too, opened in the red with th CAC, DAX and FTSE dropping nearly 1% each.

Reliance has signed a new gas agreement with RNRL today. The Supreme Court had asked the two groups to renegotiate the gas pact and base it on the fact that government is the owner of the gas and hence, has the last word on its pricing and utilisation.  Armed with the new agreement, the Anil Ambani group would now move the government seeking allocation of gas to its power plants, including its upcoming projects in Dadri, Uttar Pradesh.

Following this news the ADAG group stocks gained. RNRL jumped 3.5% to Rs 66. Reliance Communications surged 3.3% to Rs 194. Reliance Infrastructure and Reliance Capital were up 1% each at Rs 1,173 and Rs 770, respectively.

Market heavyweight, Reliance added 1% to Rs 1,063.

BSE oil & gas sector staged a smart rebound - recovering more than 3% from the low to end at 10,274. In a major decision to bring petroleum products in line with market rates, the government today freed petrol from all pricing controls and hiked diesel prices by Rs two a litre, Oil Secretary S Sundareshan announced after the meeting of the Empowered Group of Ministers. Accordingly, petrol and will cost up to Rs 3.73 per litre more, households will have to pay an additional Rs 35 per cylinder and poor man's cooking medium kerosene will be dearer by Rs 3 a litre from today.

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Oil & gas stocks soared on this news. All OMCs jumped. HPCL soared 14% to Rs 401. BPCL zoomed 13% to Rs 621. IOC surged 10% to Rs 377.

Sensex stock -ONGC rallied 6% to Rs 1,264. Essar Oil, Gail India and Aban Offshore were the other major gainers.

BSE bankex remained weak through the day. The index dropped 2% to 10,752 on fears of a rate hike by the RBI. Metal, IT and realty indices were also in red.

Among the Sensex gainers, Cipla added 1.8% to Rs 347. Maruti Suzuki, NTPC and BHEL were also up.

On the other hand, Sterlite dropped 3% to Rs 168. ICICI Bank shed 3% at Rs 857.

Mahindra & Mahindra, Wipro, HDFC Bank, HDFC, Jindal and SBI were down 2-3% each.

SBI, Tata Motors, TCS, Tata Steel, Hindustan Unilever, Hindalco, Larsen & Toubro, Infosys and ITC were the other big losers.

BSE market breadth was negative. Out of 2,959 stocks traded, 1,696 declined while 1,148 advanced.

VALUE TOPPERS...

HPCL topped the value chart with a turnover of Rs 262.90 cr, followed by BPCL (Rs 214.20 cr), RNRL (Rs 178.67 cr), IOC (Rs 144.03 cr) and ONGC (Rs 128.77 cr).