Metal sector rally continues


Bangalore: Following the positive response from the market, metal sector traded positively on the sensitive index and ended the week with a gain of 3.6 percent. The top gainers in the metal space were Bhuwalka Steel (up 25.2 percent), Lloyds Metals (up 11.8 percent), Jindal Stainless (up 11.1 percent), Tata Metaliks (up 10.6 percent), Monnet Ispat (up 10.2 percent) and Jindal Steel (up 4 percent). JSW Steel surged seven percent during the week after the company inked a deal with Japan's JFE Steel to jointly develop a 10 million ton steel project in West Bengal. SAIL surged over five percent during the week. Reports stated that the government is set to dilute its holding in SAIL by 20 percent. While the company will make a fresh issue of 10 percent equity, the government will divest 10 percent of its stake. Among the 13 sector-specific indices of the exchange, Metal sector was followed by Auto, Healthcare and Banking sector, which recorded 2.2, 1.4 and 0.5 percent respectively. As of October 24, 2009, total market capitalization of the Metal index was of 596,151.28 crore.