Stocks in the news

The stock, frozen at 20 per cent upper limit of circuit filter on Friday, has appreciated 51 per cent in the last one week from Rs 67.75 to Rs 102 on the BSE.

ICICI Bank and India Advantage Fund together sold 41.66 lakh equity shares of the company to International Synthfabs and Gayatri Exim respectively on Thursday, while UBS Securites Asia sold 28.17 lakh shares to Cresent Trading on Friday at Rs 85 a share through block deals on the bourses.

The three block deals on the BSE and the NSE saw the combined volume on the counter zooming by 25 times with 1.38 crore equity shares changing hands last week compared with 5.55 lakh shares traded previous week.

Welspun India's (WIL) acquisition of Christy, the largest towel brand of the UK, has proved to be one of the most successful collaborations in the textile industry. The UK retailer has reported profit in June 2007, one year after its acquisition by Welspun.

WIL is the top producer of terry towels in Asia and ranks fourth worldwide with a total capacity of 31,000 mtpa. The company expects its turnover to grow by 55 per cent by FY09.

The company posted 49 per cent growth in turnover to Rs 973.56 crore and 25 per cent growth in net profit to Rs 52.10 crore in FY07.

Mukta Arts: Starry show

The stock hit an all-time high of Rs 160.80, appreciating over 25 per cent in last one week. The company signed a five-year distributions deal for three films with Eros Multimedia for a sum of Rs 73 crore.

The combined turnover on the counter on the BSE and the NSE zoomed by 1,100 per cent to Rs 13.32 crore (Rs 1.11 crore) last week. The company acquired 50.1 per cent stake in Red Carpets Film earlier this month. In the last seven days, the stock gained 50 per cent from Rs 95 on November 14. The Subhash Ghai promoted company has presence in film production, television content production, film distribution and equipment hiring for film making. The company reported turnaround during the first half of current financial year. It posted a net profit of Rs 1.60 crore in the first six months between April and September compared with Rs 1.40 net loss reported in first half of the previous year.

The stock is currently trading at a price multiple of 18.63 on its trailing 12 months EPS of Rs 7.65 on the BSE.