The Hindu Business Line : Pharma stocks keeping well

Housing finance stocks have caught up in the last two trading sessions. LIC Housing, GIC Housing, SBI Housing, Dewan Housing, CanFin Homes and the market leader HDFC shot up sharply in the last two days. Stocks such as GIC hit the upper circuit filter on Friday and LIC Housing touched its 52-week high before settling at a lower level. The interest appears to be on the back of rumours that foreign housing finance companies might enter the Indian market through a domestic housing finance firm.

Home loans have seen a sharp spurt in disbursements over the last year and were one of the fastest growing segments too.

Hotels: Better view

Hotels stocks such as Indian Hotels, EIH Hotels and ITC Hotels have witnessed fresh buying.

Hotels business appears to be recovering from the 9/11 disaster. The earnings numbers for quite a few hotel companies have been encouraging as room occupancy rates have improved. The average room revenue is also expected to brighten in the future. Indian Hotels announced impressive earnings for the last quarter indicating good times ahead. ITC Hotels turned around. Indian Hotels and Oriental Hotels too have reported encouraging numbers. Indian Hotels gained 30 per cent in the past couple of weeks, ITC Hotels by about 10 per cent and EIH appreciated 8 per cent.

Domestic pharma: Good health

Domestic pharmaceutical companies such as Divi's Labs, Ranbaxy, Dr.Reddy's, Orchid Chemicals and Shasun Chemicals edged up steadily on certain company specific news. Ranbaxy got a tentative approval from the USFDA for a drug. This move would allow it to help gain ground in the US market. Orchid Chemical's recent agreement with Apotex for supply and marketing of injectible medicines in the US has lifted the sentiment in the stock.

On the other hand, multinational such as Glaxo and Pfizer weakened.

Yarn stocks: Spinning gains

Quite a few stocks of yarn manufacturing companies such as Loyal Textile Mills, Lakshmi Mills have attracted interest after announcing good earnings for the year 2002-03. Loyal Textile Mills stock almost doubled.

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