This week saw a reversal in fortunes. Equity was up, debt was down. On the contrary, last week, debt funds made marginal gains while equity funds were down. This week, like many other weeks in the past, didn't see too much excitement for funds. Corporate results continued to pour in. Some encouraging, some disheartening. The market responded well to good news. The BSE Sensex went up by almost 80 points after losing 70 points in the first trading session at the start of the week on account of the censure motion in relation to Gujarat, which was to decide the fate of the NDA government. Likewise, other indices too lost initially but gained in subsequent trading sessions.
On an average, equity diversified funds gained 1.23% as against the 0.26% increase reported by the Sensex. Almost all categories of equity funds managed to beat their respective indices. Pharma funds were up 1.15% as against a 0.84% gain on the BSE Healthcare Index. An 80% rise in the net profits of India's second-largest pharma company, Cipla, for the quarter-ended March 31, 2002, probably did the trick. Despite registering a 70% increase in net profits for the first quarter of the calendar, the country's No. 1 pharma company, Ranbaxy, saw its share price dip by Rs 22. Maybe the markets had expected good results, and discounted the same earlier. While Cipla's scrip price soared by almost Rs 80. The two majors figure in the top 5 holdings of the 3-pharma funds in existence.
Pharma apart, FMCG funds gained too. These funds gained 1.03% while the BSE FMCG Index lost about 3 points. A 55% increase, however, in the net profits of Nestle in the first quarter was a relief. Please note that both FMCG funds and equity-diversified funds have a marginal stake in Nestle.
Likewise, tech funds gained too, up 0.91% against a loss of 0.76% on the BSE IT Index. A 60% rise in net profits of Moser Baer in fiscal 2001 worked out well since 4 of the 12 tech funds have about 3-7% exposure in the company.
On the other hand, medium-term bond funds, which were up 0.23% last week, were down about 0.27% this week. Medium and long-term gilt funds also lost about 1.02%.
Fund Update: During the week, the Sensex was up 9 points while the BSE National Index gained 7 points. The key gainers were Taurus Discovery Stock (5.06%), GIC Fortune '94 (4.46%), UTI Petro (4.08%) and Pru-ICICI Power (3.38%). The major losers were ING Growth Sectors Portfolio (-1.02%), UTI Software (-0.56%), Magnum IT (-0.30%) and Pioneer ITI PE Ratio Fund (-0.21%).
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