A strong downmove may have started which  may take the Nifty to 5,940 and then to 5,850

The market closed the week with minor gains amid high volatility throughout the week on account of the expiry of the May F&O contract and the release of the GDP numbers for the last quarter of 2012-13 and the full fiscal. The dismal GDP numbers saw the benchmarks tumbling over 2% on Friday, their single day percentage fall in nearly 14 months. Timely arrival of the monsoon rains is expected to give the market its short-term direction.

The Sensex settled 56 points (0.28%) higher at 19,760 and the Nifty rose a mere two points (0.04%) to close the week at 5,986. The benchmarks closed in the positive on three of the five trading days. For the month of May, the Sensex climbed 1.31% and the Nifty gained 0.94%.

A strong downmove may have started which will may take the Nifty to 5,940 and then to 5,850.

The benchmarks settled 1.66% higher on Monday on support from the oil &gas, consumer durables and healthcare sectors. The market ended in the green on Tuesday on support from its Asian peers. The indices closed with minor losses on Wednesday, ahead of the F&O contract expiry.

Late buying in fast moving consumer goods and auto stocks helped the market close in the positive on Thursday.  Poor economic growth, coming in at a decade low of 5% for FY’13, saw the market tumble over 2% on Friday.

The BSE Consumer Durables index (up 4%) and BSE Auto index (up 3%) were the top sectoral gainers. The top losers were BSE Realty (down 6%) and BSE Bankex (down 2%).

The key gainers on the Sensex were Tata Motors (up 9%), Sun Pharmaceutical Industries (up 8%), Hero MotoCorp (up 6%), Coal India (up 5%) and BHEL (up 4%). The main losers were Cipla (down 9%), Tata Steel (down 7%), State Bank of India, GAIL India and Hindalco Industries (down 5% each).

The Nifty was led by Tata Motors (up 9%), Sun Pharma (up 8%), Hero MotoCorp (up 6%), Coal India (up 5%) and BHEL (up 4%). The main laggards on the benchmarks were Cipla (down 9%), DLF (down 8%), IDFC, Tata Steel (down 7% each) and Bank of Baroda (down 6%).

India’s economic growth slowed to 4.8% per cent in the January-March quarter and fell to a decade's low of 5% for the entire 2012-13 fiscal on poor performance of farm, manufacturing and mining sectors. Gross domestic product (GDP) had expanded by 5.1% in January-March quarter of the last fiscal and stood at 6.2% for the 2011-12 fiscal.

Reserve Bank of India (RBI) governor D Subbarao on Thursday said that the central bank is concerned about the country's current account deficit (CAD) and high retail inflation. The result of the high current-account deficit has been the depreciation of the rupee, he added.

Among companies which declared their corporate results in the week, Larsen & Toubro’s (L&T) net profit fell 6.9% to Rs1,787.94 crore on 9.9% rise in total income to Rs20,686.93 crore in Q4 March 2013 over Q4 March 2012.

Coal India (CIL) reported almost 35% rise in the consolidated net profit at Rs5,413.9 crore for the fourth quarter ended 31 March 2013compared to Rs4,013 crore for the comparable period of the previous fiscal. The consolidated net sales of the PSU went up to Rs19,904 crore from Rs19,418 crore in the quarter under review.

In international news, US markets alternated between gains and losses during the week amid speculation about whether the Federal Reserve will continue the current pace of buying $85 billion of debt each month or cut its purchases.