India, too, introduces stock futures

Mumbai: India became the 13th country in the world when it introduced stock futures trading on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) and on the National Stock Exchange (NSE) on 9 November.

The advent of stock futures trading is expected to provide the much-needed liquidity to our stock markets, which had dried up following the ban on the age-old badla system. Sebi had introduced index-based options trading in July this year.

Volumes were good on the first day of the trading, with the BSE trailing the NSE in terms of volumes. While the NSE recorded a turnover of Rs 89 crore on volumes of 47.49 lakh shares in 27 scrips, the BSE witnessed a turnover of Rs 9.20 crore on volumes of 5.10 lakh shares in 22 scrips.

In all, the NSE saw a trading of 4,503 futures contract and the BSE witnessed a trading of 432 contracts. Volumes are expected to rise substantially once the market players get used to the new system of trading. Specific stock-futures are the closest call-players can get to the good-old badla in individual stocks.

Most futures traded at a discount to stock prices to begin with in the early hours of trading, but later tracked the cash market. Larsen & Toubro topped the list of the highest-traded scrip on the BSE as well as on the NSE, with turnovers of Rs 33 crore and Rs 2.09 crore respectively.

Satyam Computers occupied the second slot with a turnover of Rs 10.07 crore, followed by Infosys Technologies (Rs 8.80 crore), Telco (Rs.5.80 crore), ACC (Rs 5.70 crore), Digital Equipment (Rs 5.60 crore), Reliance Industries (Rs 4.20 crore), ITC (Rs 3.60 crore), Ranbaxy Laboratories (Rs 2.90 crore), Tisco (Rs 2.70 crore), Sterlite Optical (Rs 1.90 crore), Dr Reddys Laboratories (Rs 1.30 crore) and Reliance Petroleum (Rs 1.20 crore).