Indices maintain rally into the sixth day

09 May 2005

After the sustained rally all through last week, not many would have expected the markets to maintain the uptrend today. But such was the buying support that the indices gained throughout the day in a secular move.

The uptrend was led from the front by IT stocks, with Infosys alone gaining close to 4 per cent. The notification regarding its sponsored ADR issue led to all round buying in the stock. Investment bank Goldman Sachs has upgraded its outlook on the Indian tech stocks.

Satyam and Wipro followed Infosys with strong gains. TCS was relatively subdued with gains of under a per cent. With today's 4 per cent gain, Infosys overtook TCS as the fourth most valuable company in terms of market capitalization behind ONGC, Reliance and NTPC.

The other sector in focus today was FMCG. Colgate Palmolive and ITC were among the major gainers in frontline stocks. Many institutional investors are loading up on FMCG stocks as they believe that the worst is over for the sector. HLL remained an exception to the up trend in FMCG stocks by closing with losses.

Another sector which had remained subdued in recent weeks and bounced back today was automobiles. All major auto makers made very good gains on the back of excellent sales volume reported for the month of April.

Sensex closed at 6481, up 93 points and the Nifty at 2001, up 23 points. Nifty May futures discount to the spot index widened to 17 points from Friday's 3 points.

Many traders would take heart from the strong closing today with the Nifty above 2,000 and Sensex nearing 6,500.