Will mkt forget disappointment brought by techs today?

It was a very dramatic day of trade. In fact, when trading began this morning, there were a lot of concern on the subprime market in the US and the way the markets there closed.

Then, Infosys comes in with its guidance, which is on rupee terms at least a lot lower and the Sensex closed almost 100 points down; the Nifty too closed to about half a percentage point or so down. So, your frontline Indices didn't have a very good day.

But the broader markets did reasonably well. Both Indices were over 0.5% up. As a result, the advance-decline ratio has closed nearly 1:1 in trade today. So, it is not looking too bad, with the broader markets performing.

No complaints on the turnover, which is still in the early days of that series; Rs 50,000 crore has been crossed quite convincingly today. So that too is not looking bad. But it was Infosys all the way, pretty much from 9 in the morning and that stock reacted, over 5% down for itself, with that rupee guidance being lowered. That had a rub-off effect on the rest of the technology pack. Satyam, TCS, HCL Technologies - all lost anywhere between 1% and 4% for themselves. So, tech was looking very weak in trade today.

The other big event for the day - late afternoon - was the fact that DLF hit the Rs 1,00,000 crore market cap and that is Rs 591 for that stock on closing. So that was a very remarkable sort of a play for a large market cap player. And that rubbed off on stocks like Unitech, GMR Infra - an associated real estate player, and Indiabulls Real Estate, which made a year-high for itself, up about 7% or thereabouts.

Outside that though, on the futures side, the discount has trimmed to two points from 20-25 points just a couple of days ago and there is a lot of action happening in that futures and options play. Midcaps are seeing the brunt of it. A lot of long positions on that particular front, Tata Steel and RNRL and some of the other stocks where you are seeing some long positions added. DLF, Power Finance and cement led by ACC saw some long positions added, though on the flip side some short positions built up in some of those technology stocks like Satyam and TCS, Infosys also and some covering in stocks like IFCI, Nagarjuna Fertilizers and GMR to wind up what's happened on the futures side.

A few winners like Tata Steel and Reliance Energy on the frontliners on the Nifty, the odd MTNL and SAIL also, Reliance Petroleum to go with it, had a very good day on the frontline indices and of course cement, we touched on that on the futures side, all of those stocks. In fact, even Prism Cement from that midcap space, making a high for itself looking good.

A few losers, included the likes of ABB, Punjab National Bank, the odd Ambuja Cement, Sterlite, Tata Motors - all of those stocks cooling off relatively in trade today. But the midcap space, we spoke about that in the breadth. Stocks like Nagarjuna Fertilizers, IOB, Gati, Aptech, all of them having a remarkable sort of a day with great volumes.

Some of the other stocks like Bank of India, Punj Lloyd, PFC all of them having a reasonable day and a couple of stocks choosing to take the day off, the odd Euro Ceramics, which has had a dream run, the odd Indian Bank and Dish TV decided to give up about 3 or 4 percentage points.

Earnings season is in full drive right now. Let us see how we can pick up tomorrow and whether we can put behind us the disappointment of what technology has delivered today.