There's no end to the quirks in the market. Investors who seemed in a hurryto get rid of Satyam till recently, were lapping up shares of the companytoday. Morgan Stanley, which had taken a bear position in the counter,turned buyer in the scrip on Wednesday. The rally in the scrip was fed byrumours that the company has bagged a huge order of $200 million to beexecuted over a period of five years. However, the identity of the otherparty could not be established. The flurry of buying in the scrip propelledthe price to go past the 8 per cent mark to ultimately touch the upperfilter of 12 per cent at Rs 3098 and close at the same level.Sterlite Industries
A day after the Sterlite scrip closed on the extended lower circuit of 12per cent, the market is again taking fancy in the counter. According torumours in the market, on Tuesday, Morgan Stanley had sold 8 lakh shares ofthe company from its offshore funds. But the retail interest in the counteris still far from negative and after Tuesday's correction, the Sterlitescrip is back on the northward journey. On Wednesday, on the BSE, theSterlite counter witnessed 17.18 lakh shares change hands aggregating Rs 119crore.
HFCL
The Pentafour Bull was on the prowl again on Wednesday this time, pulling upHimachal Futuristic. Dealers said that around eight to ten lakh shares ofthe scrip were traded in the early morning deals itself. Ultimately, morethan 49 lakh shares were traded. Market sources said that the intention isto bring the price of the scrip to a level of around 1550. The scrip closedat Rs 1403 on the BSE.
Operators' day-out
After quite a lull, operators were again in evidence during the day - in thewords of a broker, "they were having a field day," ramping up the prices oftheir favourite scrips in the first half and then booking profits in thesecond half. Scrips which gained from operator deals were DSQ Software, ZeeTelefilms and the price of Global rose up and went down on their buying andselling. Foreign institutional investors rallied around in buying support.Apart from Morgan Stanley and Capital International, other funds in actionwere Soros Fund and Oppenheimer. Indian FIs, especially insurance companieswere buying significantly in FMCG stocks, dealers said.
Vikas WSP in limelight
Vikas WSP, specialising in manufacture of industrial polymers mainly for thefood processing sector, has witnessed steady accumulation over the lastfortnight. After reacting briefly for a couple of sessions to close at Rs260 on May 25, the scrip saw a strong rally in successive sessionsthereafter to touch Rs 573 on June 5. It has recorded gains of 120 per centin just 7 trading sessions. Except for one session in between when volumestraded were only 7600 shares, in the last seven sessions, volumes exceededan average of one lakh shares per day.
In the quarter to March 31, 2000, the company's operating margins haveincreased to 42.1 per cent from 35.6 per cent in the immediately precedingquarter as a result of better realisations from odourless polymers. Thecompany is now in the process of raising Rs 150 crore from private placementof shares with FIIs which will part finance its Rs 200 crore capacityexpansion at Baroda plant with a new 12,000 tpa polymer unit.
- contributed by Janaki Krishnan, Dheer Kothari and Partha P Sinha
Copyright © 2000 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.