Five stocks make for 50% of Sensex’s rally

Reliance Industries alone accounted for 24%.

BL Research Bureau Just five stocks from the Sensex-30 basket contributed to one-half of the 3000 point rally of the benchmark index from its March 9 low.

The stock of Reliance Industries alone accounted for 24 per cent of the Sensex’s gain. Others such as ICICI Bank, Larsen and Toubro, HDFC and State Bank of India have together contributed another 27 per cent.

Though the Sensex has risen 38 per cent from the low recorded in March, not all the stocks in the 30-stock index have gained as much. There are stocks in the Sensex basket that have so far returned a relatively muted 9-16 per cent. The stock of Hindustan Unilever is up only 8.8 per cent, NTPC up 12 per cent, Infosys Technologies up 14.5 per cent and Grasim Industries up 16 per cent.

Big gains

Sensex’s current rally appears to be have been supported by five key stocks that have run up over 40 per cent.

The stock of Reliance Industries was the frontrunner with 58 per cent returns and a 739-point contribution to the Sensex rise. The next top mover was ICICI Bank, which rallied 69 per cent and added 281 points to the Sensex rally. The stocks of Larsen and Toubro, HDFC and State Bank of India have put together added another 567 points.

The contributions of these five stocks alone add up to 1586 points, or one-half of the 3124 point increase in the Sensex. On percentage basis, though few stocks such as Tata Motors (up 106 per cent), DLF (up 85 per cent), Hindalco (up 64 per cent) and Mahindra and Mahindra (up 50 per cent) made good gains, their individual contribution to Sensex was less than 50 points due to relatively lower weightage in the index.