Markets on May 25: Gains discarded

Markets shed a considerable share of their earlier-day gains during the final hour. The Sensex ended marginally higher, 26 points up, whil...

Markets shed a considerable share of their earlier-day gains during the final hour. The Sensex ended marginally higher, 26 points up, while Nifty closed one point lower. On the other hand, mid-cap and small-cap stocks ended the day on a strong note, recording gains of 2.83% and 5.01% respectively on the BSE. After today’s negative close on Nifty, the probability of the current down-move getting extended has increased. Further, the hurdle of 20-hour simple moving average (HSMA) is quite dominant for Nifty to overcome. On daily chart, the gap between the momentum indicator KST and signal line is getting slimmer.Bulls with 1,093 advances and 182 declines dominated the market breadth on the NSE.

On hourly chart, the negative crossover of KST is still intact. Our short-term bias is down for the target of 3900 with the reversal pegged at 4510. However, our mid-term bias is up for the target of 4550 with reversal placed at 3700.

Stocks from realty, healthcare and fast moving consumer goods sectors emerged as the top gainers today, while profit booking was witnessed in information technology and power stocks. From the 30 stocks of the Sensex,Ranbaxy Laboratories (up 21%) Jaiprakash Associates (up 7%) and Sterlite Industries (up 6%) led the flock of gainers,while Bharti Airtel (down 5%), National Thermal Power Corporation (down 2%) and HDFC (down 2%) led the pack of losers.