Market snaps four-week gaining streak on small-cap rout, IT stocks outperform

The Indian equity market snapped a four-week gaining momentum and posted the biggest weekly losses in the last five months in a volatile week ended March 15 amid mixed domestic as well as global data and caution in midcap and smallcap stocks.

In this week, the BSE Sensex lost 1,475.96 or 0.99 percent to end at 72,643.43 and the Nifty50 index shed 470.25 points or 2.09 percent to finish at 22,023.30.

The BSE Small-cap index plunged 6 percent with India Pesticides, Paisalo Digital, Gensol Engineering, JTL Industries, Tata Investment Corporation, Magellanic Cloud, Lancer, Containers Lines, Sanmit Infra, Paramount Communications, DB Realty, Cressanda Solution, HLV and GRM Overseas losing 20-40 percent, while gainers included Hercules Hoists, Astec Lifesciences, Cigniti Technologies, HEG, ZF Commercial Vehicle Control Systems India, Reliance Infrastructure, Poonawalla Fincorp and Novartis India.

BSE Mid-cap Index tumbled 4 percent with NMDC, Bharat Heavy Electricals, Steel Authority of India, Oil India, Zee Entertainment Enterprises, Power Finance Corporation, Biocon and Container Corporation of India falling 10-16 percent. On the other hand, Solar Industries India, Linde India, Relaxo Footwears, Colgate Palmolive (India) added 5-17 percent.

The BSE Large-cap Index shed 2.3 percent dragged by Bharat Electronics, The Tata Power Company, DLF, NTPC, Tata Steel, Bank Of Baroda, Life Insurance Corporation of India, Coal India, Punjab National Bank, Tata Motors – DVR, Power Grid Corporation of India.

In terms of the market value, Reliance Industries lost the most, followed by State Bank of India, NTPC and Tata Motors. On the other hand, Tata Consultancy Services. Bharti Airtel and ITC added the most of their market-cap. [Disclosure: Moneycontrol is a part of the Network18 group. Network18 is controlled by Independent Media Trust, of which Reliance Industries is the sole beneficiary.]

Among sectors, Nifty Realty index shed 9.4 percent, Nifty Media index fell 8.3 percent, Nifty PSU Bank slipped 8 percent, Nifty Metal Index shed 6.8 percent, while Nifty Information Technology index added 1 percent.

Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) curtained their selling during the week as they sold equities worth of Rs 816.91 crore, while Domestic institutional investors (DIIs) continued their support as they bought equities worth Rs 14,147.5 crore.

The Indian rupee lost 10 paise against the US dollar in the week ended March 15 as it closed at 82.88 verus the March 7 closing 82.78.