Market Movers: Oil pack slips; YES Bank jumps; HCL Tech faints; smallcaps make merry

NEW DELHI: The bears clawed back to take hold on Dalal Street on Thursday, as fast rising Covid cases raised fears that some areas could go back into the red zone and, this, face more restrictions.

The unending wait for a stimulus package from the government has started taking a toll on investors' sentiment, even as subdued earnings added to the worries, said analysts.

ONGC and NTPC were among the biggest losers in the Sensex pack while IndusInd Bank, M&M and Reliance Industries were among the top gainers.

Here are key trends from Thursday’s trade:

Oil explorers get reality check
Oil explorers plunged after Moody’s in a report said earnings of ONGC and Oil India will take a hit due to lower oil prices. ONGC tanked 4.54 per cent to Rs 76.65 while GAIL dropped 3.33 per cent to Rs 91.50. Oil marketers continued to fall as the government asked them to absorb the hike in excise duty. BPCL jumped 4.06 per cent to Rs 329.60, while Indian Oil and HPCL dropped about a per cent each.

Q4 impact: YES Bank, HCL Tech
YES Bank, which reported a surprise profit thanks to an exceptional item, jumped 20 per cent in morning deals but gave up some gains to end 6.83 per cent higher at Rs 28.15. HCL Tech erased morning gains and dropped 1.5 per cent to Rs 511.80 even though the company had beat Street estimates and reported a 22.8 per cent year-on-year (YoY) rise in consolidated net profit at Rs 3,154 crore.

Smallcaps stand out
The Nifty Smallcap index stood out among its peers, rising 0.54 per cent to 3,944 against a 0.54 per cent cut in Nifty Midcap index and a 0.78 per cent drop in Nifty. BEML, Avanti Feeds, Deepak Nitrate, Persistent Systems and Sobha were among the top gainers in Nifty Smallcap index, rising up to 6 per cent.

Insider trade: Apollo Pipes, Astra Microwave
Sameer Gupta, promoter of Apollo Pipes further increased his stake in the company, buying 1.51 lakh shares. He bought 1.25 lakh shares the previous day. Similarly, SG Reddy, director of Astra Microwave bought 4,527 shares of the company. The stock, however, dipped 0.17 per cent to Rs 60.30 while Apollo Pipes gained 1.64 per cent to Rs 316.55 following the transaction.

Stocks that hit 52-week lows
Over 90 shares crashed to their 52-week lows during the trade. They included AU Small Finance Bank, Bank of Baroda, Godrej Industries, IIFL Finance, Lemon Tree, SIS and Quess Corps, among others.

Over 200 stocks hit upper circuits
Over 200 stocks including stocks like Venky’s, Tejas Networks, Va Tech Wabag, Future Retail, Sadbhav Engineering, Future Consumer, Infibeam Avenue and Suzlon Energy, among others, hit their upper circuit limits in a weak market.

Stocks that gave ‘buy’ signal
As many as 26 stocks gave buy signals on BSE, as they crossed above the signal line on trend indicator MACD. They includes JM Financial, Hindustan Zinc, Bombay Dyeing, Balrampur Chini, Titan Biotech and Ruchira Papers, among others.

Stocks that gave ‘sell’ signal
Nearly 130 stocks gave ‘sell’ signals as they crossed below the signal line on the MACD chart. They included BPCL, IndianOil, Coal India, Reliance Power, Titan, Safari Industries, Hexaware Tech and UCO Bank, among others.

Where is Nifty headed?
Nifty traded in a narrow range today and ultimately formed an Inside bar on the daily chart, said analysts. The breakout level on the downside is at 9,116. On the other hand, the key hourly moving averages continued to act as a barrier for yet another day. “Going ahead, 9,350-9,400 will continue to pose as a hurdle zone on the upside. Structurally, the next move down looks around the corner unless these levels are surpassed on closing basis. A fresh short position can be initiated on break of 9,,116 with the key targets at 8,900 and 8,700,” Gaurav Ratnaparkhi, Senior Technical Analyst, Sharekhan by BNP Paribas.