Looking beyond 'Black Swans'

Tue, 22 Mar Closing

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The Indian stock markets continued to move within a narrow range during the closing hours of trade. Consequently, the positive momentum was not disturbed and the indices managed to log in strong gains for the day today. The BSE-Sensex closed with gains of around 150 points where as NSE-Nifty edged higher by around 50 points (up 0.9%). BSE Midcap and BSE Small cap indices also performed well, edging higher by 0.8% and 0.5% respectively. On the Sensex, more than 6 stocks gained for every one that closed in the negative today.

Almost all the Asian indices closed in the positive today whereas Europe is also trading in the positive currently. The rupee was trading at Rs 44.95 to the dollar at the time of writing.

Today, the markets seemed to have put behind the disappointments of the several black swan events plaguing global economy in recent times. Instead, they took a great degree of comfort from economic news that highlighted how economic growth is moving ahead and global economy is recovering from the worst crisis since the Great Depression. However, it is anybody's guess whether this trend will sustain itself or not.

Tata Power, one of India's largest private sector power firms, closed in the positive today. It should be noted that the company today announced its partnership with Australian firm Sunengy for executing a solar power project in India this year. The partnership will allow Tata Power to build a pilot plant for its low-cost, floating on water, solar technology in India by end of this year. Although the financial detail about the partnership has not been disclosed, construction is likely to commence in August 2011. This partnership, we believe, will go some distance in fulfilling Tata Power's dream of taking its solar power capacity to nearly 3000 MW. The company's upcoming projects include the 4,000-MW ultra mega power project at Mundra in Gujarat, which is likely to be commissioned in August, 2011.

Auto stocks closed mostly strong today with Maruti Suzuki emerging among the top gainers. The stock closed nearly 4% higher today. We believe it was more a case of bargain buying rather than anything news specific. With the earthquake and tsunami rocking Japan, there were apprehensions about the company's ability to continue growing at the same pace as before given its dependence on imports from the land of rising sun. This then led to investors taking the stock to cleaners over the past few sessions. As today's strength in the counter shows, the selling was perhaps a bit overdone what with the stock staging a strong comeback. Thus, with the air cleared, the stock should stabilise going forward.