Articles by D P Sharma

Conventional Wisdom Proved Wrong D P Sharma THE stock market has continued to push its way up. On April 2 it scaled a new peak with the BSE sensitive index touching a high of 4546.48 and the national index moving up to 2048.97, the 'circuit-breaker' notwithstanding. The closings were lower at 4387.76 and 1991.11 respectively. The strong upsurge in equity prices which carried the BSE sensitive cent) in just three trading sessions was attributable

Oilseeds: Still Muddling Through D P Sharma THE downward drill in the prices of vegetable oils", edible as well as non-edible, continues and the fall since about the begin - ning of January has been fairly big

( lakh bales), leaving a carryover stock at the end of the season at 28.39 lakh bales which would be sufficient to meet mills' requirement for over three months.

Guarding the Guard D P Sharma THE Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI) which had hitherto been functioning only under administrative guidelines has now been accorded the much-needed statutory status through a presidential ordinance arming it with wide-ranging powers to regulate almost every aspect of stock exchange and capital market-related activity, covering registration and regulation of stockbrokers, sub- brokers, share transfer agents, bankers to an issue, merchant bankers, underwriters, portfolio managers, investment advisors, investment schemes of mutual funds and monitoring and acquisition of shares and takeovers.

Bridging the Edible Oils Gap D P Sharma THE edible oils scenario has undergone a perceptible change since about the beginning of January. Prices which had been ruling firm till about the end of December reflecting mainly the failure of the groundnut crop in Saurashtra have come down by 4 to 18.5 per cent from their January 3 highs (for details see the accompanying table). The decline in prices has had very little to do with the government's efforts to discipline the market through persuasion (voluntary groundnut oil price freeze) and coercion (dehoarding drive). Apart from being altogether ill-conceived, the scheme of voluntary oil price freeze was never really implemented earnestly by the trade and industry. And the dehoarding drive had only a marginal impact. Going by press reports, the Gujarat government seized groundnut oil and seeds belonging to GROWFED worth Rs 11.55 crore from Junagad. Significantly enough, the entire stock was said to have been sold to NDDB. GROWFED the state's largest co-operative complex has often figured as a buying and selling agency of NDDB.