Stock Market Tips

Maruti Suzuki India rose 3.29% to Rs 1,530.05 at 11:15 IST on BSE on reports the company will increase the prices of its vehicles across all models by up to Rs 20,000 from January 2013.

Meanwhile, the BSE Sensex was up 39.88 points, or 0.20%, to 19,526.68.

On BSE, 45,000 shares were traded in the counter as against an average daily volume of 67,859 shares in the past one quarter.

The stock hit a high of Rs 1,537 so far during the day, which is also a 52-high for the counter. The stock hit a low of Rs 1,493.95 so far during the day. The stock had hit a 52-week low of Rs 905.55 on 19 December 2011.

The stock had underperformed the market over the past one month till 6 December 2012, rising 1.84% compared with the Sensex's 3.56% rise. The scrip had, however, outperformed the market in past one quarter, spurting 25.12% as against Sensex's 12.34% rise.

India's largest car maker by sales has an equity capital of Rs 144.46 crore. Face value per share is Rs 5.

According to reports, the company will hike prices due to increasing pressure on its margins due to currency fluctuation.

Maruti Suzuki currently sells a variety of models starting from Alto to Kizashi at a price range starting from Rs 2.09 lakh to Rs 17.52 lakh (ex-showroom Delhi).

Maruti Suzuki's total vehicle sales rose 12.5% to 1,03,200 units in November 2012 over November 2011. Total domestic sales rose 9.7% to 90,882 units in November 2012 over November 2011. Total export sales jumped 38.4% to 12,318 units in November 2012 over November 2011.

Maruti Suzuki India's net profit declined 5.4% to Rs 227.50 crore on 8.5% growth in net sales to Rs 8070.10 crore in Q2 September 2012 over Q2 September 2011.

The company said the year-on-year decline in net profit was due to lower non-operating income. The growth in net sales was on account of sales of new model 'Ertiga' and enhanced export realizations.

While earnings before interest, depreciation, taxation and amortization (EBITDA) rose 15.4% year-on-year, a 30.4% surge in depreciation resulted in fall in bottom line, Maruti Suzuki India said in a statement. Maruti said it enhanced sales promotion measures for petrol driven cars in Q2 September 2012 in a bid to counter subdued demand for petrol driven cars in India, which adversely impacted profitability.

Maruti said it continues to focus on component localisation and reduction in cost and overheads. The company said that it had a customer wait list of nearly 1.25 lakh units for its diesel vehicles.

Japanese parent Suzuki Motor Corporation holds 54.21% stake in Maruti Suzuki India.

Stock Market Tips

The markets logged significant gains for the second straight day on the back of all-round buying. The BSE benchmark index, the Sensex, breezed past the highest level for this calendar year to touch a fresh high of 19,205. The Sensex finally ended with a gain of 1.7 per cent (329 points) at 19,171 following its Tuesday's 305-point rally.

In the process of recording a fresh calendar year high, the BSE benchmark index has now gained a whopping 24 per cent (3,712 points) so far this year.

The NSE Nifty rallied 98 points to 5,855, and has zoomed 26.6 per cent so far this year.

The broader markets also ended with notable gains. The BSE Midcap index spurted 1.3 per cent to 6,827, and the Smallcap index was up 0.5 per cent at 7,216.

Among sectors, the BSE Realty index zoomed 3.4 per cent to 2,002. The Bankex rallied 2.8 per cent to 13,751, and the auto index jumped over 2 per cent to 10,849. The IT index, however, ended in red at 5,856, down 0.4 per cent.

The market breadth was fairly positive - out of 3,064 stocks traded on the BSE, 1,681 advanced and 1,264 declined today.

INDEX MOVERS & SHAKERS

Bajaj Auto soared 5 per cent to Rs 1,953. ICICI Bank and Tata Motors rallied over 4.5 per cent each to Rs 1,082 and Rs 278, respectively.

Cipla surged 3.5 per cent to Rs 405. Sterlite Industries and HDFC rallied around 3 per cent each to Rs 105 and Rs 821, respectively.

HDFC Bank, Larsen & Toubro and Tata Power gained around 2.5 per cent each. A total of 21 out of the 30 stocks gained over a per cent each in today's trade.

On the other hand, Hero MotoCorp and Infosys slipped a per cent each to Rs 1,823 and Rs 2,445, respectively.

BHEL and Maruti Suzuki were the only other losers among the Sensex 30 stocks.

VALUE & VOLUME TOPPERS

Apollo Hospitals topped the value chart with a turnover of Rs 415.60 crore on the BSE. It was followed by United Spirits (Rs 221.25 crore), Karnataka Bank (Rs 65.27 crore), SBI (Rs 64.07 crore) and Jet Airways (58.65 crore).

Suzlon Energy led the volume chart with trades of around 16.71 million shares followed by Unitech (12.10 million), Alok Industries (11.25 million), SpiceJet (6.9 million) and Lanco Infratech (5.7 million).

Stock Market Updates Today

A reduction of the withholding tax on rupee infrastructure bonds from 20 percent to 5 percent is high on the government's agenda, the Reserve Bank of India's Deputy Governor HR Khan said on Friday, on the sidelines of an industry event.


The government had cut the withholding tax on external commercial borrowings and on dollar-denominated infrastructure bonds recently.