Coming back to the market, for the opening half an hour values moved up, but started sliding seriously thereafter. A recovery brought back most of the loss before mid-noon. But thereafter the Sensex decidedly dived south. ACC has a good chance to bounce back from Wednesday's closing. The fall in ACC from Rs 1820 to Rs 1738 typifies the market sentiment. This scrip was being held high sheerly by the possibility of a scramble for its shares for controlling interest. But with volumes remaining same as that of the previousday, the scrip fell sharply. It does show the kind of loss of confidence in the market.

Operators have sensed that it made no sense holding on to scrips especially at high prices. The interesting aspect is that this reaction comes on the eve of the budget. That adds weight to the loss of hope amongst operators. Take a look at HLL, which normally withstands market storms. Despite falling from Rs 1661 to Rs 1635 the previous day the scrip could neither bounce back nor resist. It went down by another Rs 15 or one per cent.

The same sentiment is reflected when MTNL finds that no one wants to stake in fortunes even at Rs 234. ICICI too got hit with the scrip sliding down to Rs 103.60. IPCL's fall is quite understandable given its results. BHEL may not have found takers, since sanctions on funds for power projects would affect its future earning potential. But the scrip refuses to go down in a big fashion. The same characteristic marks BSES. Arvind is even better. It withstood its ground in Wednesday's stormymarket. That shows its potential. In the same category falls Glaxo and Grasim. Colgate continues to give way bit by bit. There is a fight between the market brand value for this scrip and the competition it now faces from HLL. In technical parlance the Sensex has reached the oversold region, but the short term indicator has not triggered a buy yet. For the market as a whole, the question for Thursday is will there be a short recovery? In my view the best strategy is to build in the possibility of a fall of another 30 points even in such an event.