Scared brokers, jittery investors

The high volatility in the market has cut stock brokers’ advisory role short. “Nowadays, when clients give a sell order, we simply execute it. We don’t advise them otherwise,” said a broker who handles high net worth individuals (HNIs) as clients. His comment quite sums up the market mood on Wednesday.

After former Satyam Computers Chairman B Ramalinga Raju’s confessional letter on January 7, many stocks fell over 25 per cent on a single day. Jaiprakash Associates fell 29.15 per cent, IVRCL Infra 27.14 per cent and Lanco Infratech 25.38 per cent on that day itself.

Since then, many others like Glenmark Pharma, Suzlon Energy, United Spirits, Educomp Solutions, Indiabulls Real Estate and Rolta have seen over 17 per cent single day fall. And many of them have suffered due to market rumours that something is wrong with the companies.

And there are many stories going around. Sample this: A private sector refiner is sitting on $4 billion foreign exchange losses because of exposure to oil futures in the international market. Another finance company has defaulted on its commercial papers and debentures.

Given such a scenario, most brokers are sitting tight. A head of a broking firm said, “We are adopting a passive role right now. HNIs have multiple sources of information and they are refusing to listen.” For instance, on January 21, the share price of Educomp Solutions plunged 28.83 per cent to a 52-week low of Rs 1,375 on rumours that the company has manipulated their books. It took five trading sessions to recoup the losses.

Some advisors said that they had tried convincing their clients that they should offload only some part of the portfolio. But all arguments were put to rest when clients popped the all-important question – what if this is another Satyam.

Many are even refraining from cost-averaging after having burnt their fingers in the Satyam saga. Some investors tried to do that on January 7 and bought Satyam’s shares at Rs 75-80, only to sell it back at Rs 45-50. Typically, retail investors are always asked to follow the following three rules while investing: Whether this is a Sensex or Nifty stock; do foreign institutional investors have a large holding in them; and whether the company management’s track record has been satisfactory.

Gul Tekchandani, investment adviser, said such things are bound to happen in a bear market, when investors have already lost significant amount of money. “Many brokers and PMS managers took unreasonable positions with their clients’ money when stock market was high. In some cases, this happened even without the clients’ knowledge. When the markets fell, the entire money was wiped out,” said Tekchandani.

Obviously, most of them are being more than careful now. “Our clients have shifted to public sector companies in the same sectors,” said Mayank Shah, chief executive officer (retail), Anagram Securities. For instance, many investors have replaced Reliance Industries with ONGC, ICICI with State Bank of India and Reliance Power with NTPC.

Another strategy that many investors are following is lie-low approach. Anup Bagchi, executive director, ICICI Securities said, “Investors want to get out of active fund management and look at index exchange-traded funds.”