Dalal Street will be pinning its hope on Diwali, the festival of lights when the goddess of wealth 'Lakshmi' is worshipped, for reversing the downslide
MUMBAI: Dalal Street will be pinning its hope on Diwali, the festival of lights when the goddess of wealth 'Lakshmi' is worshipped, for reversing the downslide continuing in stock valuations for more than 10 months.
Since 2000, markets have registered a fall only twice on the day of Diwali, when business is conducted for one hour as a muhurat trading -- the occasion marking opening of books.
However, just like the last year, this time around too the pre-Diwali trend has been negative on the bourses, adding to the concerns that a fall could be seen on the Diwali muhurat trading for the second consecutive year.
The stock market's benchmark Sensex had settled 151 points down on last Diwali, although it recovered nearly half the total intra-day loss of about 300 points.
Prior to 2007, the Sensex had slipped in a muhurat trading in 2000. The last Diwali had marked the fifth consecutive day of fall for the Sensex. Indicating a similar trend, the Sensex on Monday continued its downhill journey for the fourth straight trading session and a fall on Tuesday would make it fifth consecutive day of losses on a Diwali day.
However, on a positive note, the slide was limited to only the blue-chips last year as the Midcap and Small-cap indices had closed in the positive territory.
The Sensex closed 191.51 points down on Monday at 8,509.59 points -- its lowest level in nearly three years. However, the index rebounded sharply today from an intra-day loss of more than 1,000 points. In the previous trading session on Friday, the Sensex had lost 1,071 points -- its biggest ever single- day fall after a 1,408-point plunge on January 21 this year.
Since last Diwali, when the Sensex stood at 18,907.60 points, the benchmark index has lost about 10,400 points or over 55 per cent, while more than Rs 40 trillion has been wiped off from the investors' wealth.
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