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DCW, EIH, GE Shipping gain; Skindia GDR index up 34 points to 652.87

The Indian Global Depository Receipts recovered by 33.79 points during the week ended March 31.

The financial markets ended the fiscal year 1998-99 on a positive note.

The market got a major push on the back of institutional buying as they wanted to report better NAVs for March 31, 1999. Average premium of the 64 depository receipts shot up to 3.01 per cent on March 31 from 0.64 per cent on March 25.

Active buying interest could also be noticed from the fact that the spreads between the bid and ask of the 38 actively traded DRs narrowed down to 9.24 per cent on March 31 from 19.99 per cent on March 25.

During the week, the 64 GDRs on an average gained by 1.04 per cent while the shares depreciated by 1.33 per cent.

During the week, there were 31 gainers, 22 losers and ten remained unchanged as compared with 26 gainers, 19 losers and 18 unchanged on March 25.

The top gainers for the week were DCW 33.33 per cent ($ 1), East India Hotel 12.97 per cent ($ 5.23) and Great Eastern Shipping 12.63 per cent ($ 2.68) while the top losers were Indo Gulf 20.83 per cent ($ 0.48), Videocon International 14.52 per cent ($ 1.33) and Tata Electric 13.33 per cent ($ 130.00).

According to a Skindia Finance media statement, the financial year 1998-99 was dominated by two main events: India conducting nuclear tests and the fear of second southeast Asian crisis. These events had a major impact on the capital markets.

In 1998-99, the Skindia GDR Index lost by 25.95 per cent while the BSE Sensex lost only 5.78 per cent. The Skindia GDR Index touched a 52-week high of 952.29 points on April 9, 1998 and the 52-week low of 481.61 on August 18, 1998.

The 52-week high low for the BSE Sensex were 4280.96 on April 21, 1998 and 2764.16 on October 21, 1998.

On an average, GDRs lost by 23.67 per cent in the fiscal 1998-99 and the shares by 19.40 per cent. Finolex Cables, Dr Reddy's and Usha Beltron were top gainers in the GDRs and shares, Finolex Cables gained by 90.40 per cent to $ 8.43, Dr Reddy's 67.44 per cent to $ 18.00 and Usha Beltron 50 per cent to $ 1.50 in the GDRs and in shares 91.85 per cent to Rs 377.75, 102.59 per cent to Rs 862.00 and 71.84 per cent to Rs 88.50 in the shares respectively.

Steel was the top loser in both GDRs and shares with a loss of 46.54 per cent and 44.47 per cent respectively. Hotel sector was the other major loser in the GDRs and textiles in the shares.

The stocks headed downward in the first half, with GDRs on an average losing by 31.50 per cent and the shares by 30.56 per cent as compared to a loss of 33.42 per cent in Skindia GDR Index and 21.85 per cent in the BSE Sensex.

During the second half, the GDRs on an average gained by 12.85 per cent and the shares by 11.77 per cent. The Skindia GDR Index gained by 13.39 per cent and BSE Sensex by 20.55 per cent in the same period.

UNI

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