8:00AM Kellwood posted Q1 earnings drop, named a new CEO.
Kellwood Company (
KWD: chart) reported Q1 net income decline to $7.4 million, or 28 cents a share, down from $9.2 million, or 36 cents a share a year ago. The quarterly earnings missed analyst expectations of 20 cents a share. The retailing company said sales increased to $494 million from $484 million. Earnings from continuing operations rose to 23 cents a share, compared to 4 cents a share last year. Kellwood projected Q2 net income in the range of 37 to 39 cents a share. The company also named Gregory W. Kleffner as CEO and said board member Robert Baer Kellwood retired.
7:30AM NY-6:30PM Mumbai Sensex declines sharply Friday in a volatile trading.
The
Sensex on BSE finished Friday 122.37 points lower, or 0.86%, at 14,063.81.
The market-breadth was negative as there were more than three decliners for every two advancers. For 957 stocks which advanced, 1,464 stocks declined and only 74 stocks remained unchanged. Of the 30 stocks in the Sensex, only five advanced, while all the rest declined. The turnover on BSE was Rs 4,592 crore, compared with 4,289 crore on Thursday. On NSE, the turnover was Rs 10,577.41 crore, higher than Rs 9,092 crore on Thursday.
Economic news
The wholesale price index in India advanced 4.85% in the period up to May 26 2007, lower than 5.06%, the previous week and also lower than the predicted 5.05%.
The Indian rupee continued its downward trend and lost against the dollar on Friday, June 8 2007. The partially convertible rupee stood at 41.01 in early afternoon It had settled at 40.74 on June 7 2007.
The government may not sell the Dabhol power plant LNG receipt facility as NTPC has been asked to invest Rs 500 crore to save the project from collapsing on payments to contractors.
Trading highlights
Reliance Industries was the most-active stock with a turnover of Rs 187.70 crore followed by Nitin Fire and Infosys.
Advancers
Hindalco and Satyam surged almost 3% each to Rs 158 and Rs 495, respectively. Hindalco gained for the third day in a row on speculation that Alcan may combine with Sterlite Industries to bid for Hindalco.
TCS and ONGC spurted over 1% each to Rs 1,221 and Rs 548, respectively. ONGC rallied after the company said it had discovered five new finds of oil and gas at its blocks in the east coast and the north east of the country. Wipro also gained 0.4% to Rs 548.
Decliners
Tata Steel plunged nearly 5% to Rs 586, as it was in negative territory throughout the session. ACC slumped 4.5% to Rs 769. HDFC and Tata Motors tumbled over 3.5% each to Rs 1,754 and Rs 654, respectively.
Auto stocks were weak on worries of slowdown in demand. Hero Honda slumped 2.4% to Rs 681 and Bajaj Auto shed 1.8% to Rs 2,117. Large-cap Maruti Udyog finished lower by 3.2% to Rs 737.
Ranbaxy shed 2.5% to Rs 369. Index heavy Reliance Industries declined 0.5% to Rs 1,660. Reliance KG basin blocks will be operational in one year''s time.
