Markets may remain under pressure

Markets may remain under pressure in the coming days as the Nifty index continues to stay under the 200 DMA. So it would be advisable to stay in the sidelines and be cautious.



Markets slipped into the red in the last hour of the trading session as selling in Oil & Gas and select IT and Telecom stocks dragged the Nifty index below the 5k mark again. The sentiments were further dampened as European markets also were trading lower. However, the metal, FMCG, banking and realty stocks attracted buying interest.



Finally, the BSE benchmark Sensex ended 108 points lower to close at 16,752 and the Nifty index gained 54 points to close at 4,957.



Overall about 1,410 stocks advanced; 1,305 stocks declined while 69 stocks remained unchanged. Among the 50-Nifty 32 stocks ended in red and 18 stocks ended in green.

Mphasis rallied by over 10% to Rs242 after Hewlett-Packard (H-P) and Electronic Data Systems (EDS) confirmed that they were in advanced discussions to strike a deal whereby H-P could acquire the technology services giant. The deal could be wroth up to US$13bn, the Wall Street Journal reports citing unnamed sources close to the matter.

H-P said it would have no further comment regarding a possible business combination involving the two companies, until either a deal is reached or talks are broken off. The acquisition would be HP's biggest since its $19bn acquisition of Compaq in 2002. Shares of EDS rose nearly 28%, taking its market value to about US$12bn. HP shares fell nearly 5% amid some skepticism that slow-growing EDS, still considered in turnaround mode, would provide more than a one-time boost, and might not be worth a premium of as much as 37%.

SBI gained by a half a percent to Rs1668 after the company said that they would expand into general insurance biz. The bank tied up with Insurance Australia where, SBI would hold 74% and Insurance Australia would hold 26% in the venture. The scrip touched an intra-day high of Rs1690 and a low of Rs1651 and recorded volumes of over 3,00,000 shares on BSE.



Jindal Stainless advanced by 0.5% to Rs142 after reports stated that the company signed a joint venture agreement with the Indonesia-based PT Antam Tbk to develop a nickel smelting and stainless steel facility in North Konawe, South East Sulawesi at an investment of about Rs29bn. Antam will hold 55% stake in the project. The scrip touched an intra-day high of Rs145 and a low of Rs142 and recorded volumes of over 26,000 shares on BSE.



Sita Shree Food slipped 2.6% to Rs46. The company announced that it received export orders worth Rs100mn from Vietnam, Pakistan, UAE, KSA and turkey. Moreover the company executed export orders worth Rs83mn during april- may'08. The scrip touched an intra-day high of Rs49 and a low of Rs45 and recorded volumes of over 13,00,000 shares on BSE.



Philips Carbon fell by 2.3% to Rs184. There were reports stating that, the company doubled investment commitment to Rs3bn from Rs1.5bn in its Vietnam joint venture, as the capacity for the plant has been raised to 1 lakh tons from 50,000 tons planned earlier. The scrip touched an intra-day high of Rs194 and a low of Rs181 and recorded volumes of over 12,000 shares on BSE.



RCom slipped by a percent to Rs545. According to reports the French-US equipment firm Alcatel-Lucent has formed a joint venture with RCom to offer managed-net-work services to domestic as well as international telecom operators. The scrip touched an intra-day high of Rs559 and a low of Rs541 and recorded volumes of over 11,00,000 shares on BSE.



GAIL India slipped by 2% to Rs408. The company announced its Q4 results with net profit at Rs7.22bn (up 6%) and net sales at Rs49.35bn (up 27%). The company also said that they plan to invest Rs34.13bn this fiscal year, they would also invest Rs25.65bn on pipelines and Rs5bn in exploration and production. The scrip touched an intra-day high of Rs422 and a low of Rs405 and recorded volumes of over 3,00,000 shares on BSE.