450 scrips hit 52-week highs in a week

Over 450 stocks have raced to touch their 52-week highs on the Bombay Stock Exchange in the past one week even as the bellwether Sensex struggles to get closer to its lifetime high of 15,868.85, indicating broad-based rise on the domestic bourses.

Of the 450 stocks, 243 stocks "" mostly small- and mid-caps "" touched their 52-week highs on Tuesday. Both the Sensex and Nifty ended the day with declines of 0.34 and 0.24 per cent respectively.

Mehraboon Irani, vice-president equity at Darashaw & Co, said: "This shows that it is not always necessary to time the markets. Often one should look at how good a particular stock is and buy it if you feel it is worth at this levels."

He feels that during the recent correction of over 1,000 points in August, there was no panic selling seen in the market, which is why the bounce back was strong.

"During the recent correction most investors did not empty their entire portfolios or sell good stocks as they did last year when the markets corrected.

Also, a substantial buying by the domestic institutions enabled the markets to restrict the fall, he said.

Among the large caps, Reliance Industries, NTPC, HDFC, Reliance Energy and Grasim Industries are trading at one-year highs. Even though some of them slipped marginally they were above their previous high.

Titan Industries, ABB, IPCL, Crompton Greaves, Punj Lloyd, Pidilite Industries, among others, are also trading at one-year highs.

Market experts said the recent bounceback, after the sharp fall in August, was a result of a broad-based rally rather than buying in a select few. Brokers point out that it is not only Sensex stocks, which are moving up, but also mid- and small-cap stocks.

Both the BSE Mid-cap and Small-cap lost a marginal ground after touching the all-time high of Tuesday. The Mid-cap index touched the all-time high of 6,950.58, while the Small-cap index touched a high of 8,610.97.

Fifteen stocks of the mid-cap index hit a 52-week high, while 33 stocks hit a 52-week high in the small-cap index on Tuesday. Mid-cap stocks included Dena Bank, Vijaya Bank, Petronet LNG, Madras Cement, UCO Bank and Voltas among others.

The small-cap stocks included Provogue, UTV software, Carol Infosystems, Manali Petroleum, Mercator Lines and Orient papers among others.