Market continues to fluctuate

The volatile roller-coaster ride in the Indian stock markets continued unabated. Market capitalisations of many shares fell sharply with aut...

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The volatile roller-coaster ride in the Indian stock markets continued unabated. Market capitalisations of many shares fell sharply with auto and tech shares taking the maximum brunt. Till Thursday the Sensex had already lost 285 points, after gaining 368 points in six earlier sessions. Punters now feel that looming elections and beginning of the political uncertainty may erode shareholder wealth further in the coming days.

Hungry for more

A series of initial public offerings (IPOs) has once again showed that Indian investors do have a large appetite for good paper. At last count, small investors had poured in almost Rs 25,000 crore in the six big-ticket IPOs which went on sale last week. Since, only few will get final allotment of shares, their refunds will be up for grabs for any good company which is looking for funds.

Cheaper Hellos

A price war has erupted in India’s international phone services market after Data Access offered to connect calls from Bharat Sanchar’s network to the US, the UK and Canada sectors at a big discount to the existing price. Data Access offered BSNL a ‘settlement rate’ of Rs 1.69 a minute, far less than Rs 9 BSNL currently pays for US connections. You can now expect your calls to cost less when talking to your friends and family abroad.

Moaning on about BPO

As US presidential polls come nearer, the protest against outsourcing is growing. On Tuesday, the US Trade Representative Robert Zoellick warned that India could face increased barriers to the US market unless they open their own markets to more American exports. This American war cry has already affected shares of Indian infotech companies. If you are an investor of Infosys, you have already lost close to 20.24 per cent of your holding value since its recent high on January 9.