Cyclical, commodity stocks under selling pressure
Mumbai: The stock market is witnessing a selling pressure on cyclical and commodities stocks. Several pivotals in the sector retreated leading to the 30-share Sensex of the Bombay Stock Exchange shedding 48 points to close at 4494.18. Market analysts are of the opinion that the market will witness further fall before any recovery. Balarpur Industries, Century Textiles, Bharat Petroleum, Gujarat Narmada Fertiliser, MTNL and Arvind Mills stocks showed downtrend. Other scrips that showed large losses were Larsen & Toubro, ACC, Gujarat Ambuja Cements and Telco.

The redeeming feature in a weakening market has been the firmness shown by infotech stocks. Infosys Technologies crossed the Rs 5,000 mark to touch Rs 5,063.55, a gain of 5 per cent. Other large and medium IT stocks also fared well. Satyam Computers went up by Rs 86 to Rs 1,765.85 and SSI by Rs 38 to Rs 519.55. Pentafour, NIIT and Digital Equipment also gained substantially. One of the IT scrips, Aftek Infosys, attracted buyers and its price went up by the maximum permissible limit of 8 per cent to close at Rs 127.65. The Zee Telefilms stock too continued to be active and gained Rs 56 to close at Rs 2,178.

Foreign institutional investors have been key buyers of IT stocks.

The S&P CNX Nifty also declined , closing 20.55 points lower at 1,289.60.
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Harshad Mehta allowed to apply for ACC rights
Mumbai: The special court handling the securities scam-related cases has allowed Harshad Mehta, one of the key accused in the case, to apply for the rights issue of Associated Cement Companies.

ACC had moved an application in the court requesting it to deny the rights to Mr Mehta.

Justice Rane of the court, dismissing ACC's argument that any further shareholding in the company by Mr Mehta will provide him with powers to intervene in the smooth functioning of the management and destabilise it, ruled that there is no ground for it to refuse Mr Mehta his right to apply for the rights offer.
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More companies raise limit for NRI investments
Mumbai: More companies are raising the limits for investment by non-resident Indians and overseas corporate bodies in their companies through market purchases.

The Bombay Stock Exchange has announced a list of 77 companies, which have raised the limit of investment by NRIs or OCBs under portfolio investment scheme from 10 per cent to 24 per cent with effect from 29 July 1999. These companies have passed necessary resolutions at their general body meetings.

The maximum permissible limit for such investment is 30 per cent. The companies in the list include Arvind Mills, BPL, Essar Oil, Essar Shipping, Essar Steel, Grasim Industries, Reliance Industries and Silverline Industries.
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Sun F&C for overseas equity funds
Calcutta: Sun F&C Mutual Fund, the joint venture between the Foreign & Colonial Emerging Markets group and Sun Securities (India), will launch a global equity and income fund, which will invest in overseas securities market.

The fund has already filed offer documents with the Securities and Exchange Board of India.

Nikhil N. Khatau, chief executive officer of Sun F&C Asset Management India, says the mutual fund is eyeing the foreign market as there are attractive opportunities for Indian investors to diversify investment portfolio and move away from the single country, single market and single currency format.
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