Infy falls 13% on BSE, investors lose Rs 20,000 cr :rediff

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In its biggest fall in nearly three years, Infosys on Friday plummeted by about 13 per cent, wiping out nearly Rs 20,000 crore (Rs 200 billion) in market value, as disgruntled investors resorted to hectic selling after a muted revenue guidance for the current fiscal by the software bellwether.

After opening nearly 8 per cent down in morning trade, selling pressure intensified with Infosys stock closing at Rs 2403.30, down 12.61 per cent lower on the BSE. During the day, the stock dived 13 per cent to a intra-day low of Rs 2,390.10.

Shares of the country's second largest IT exporter received a similar drubbing on NSE as well where it closed 12.75 per cent down at Rs 2,399.95.

Trading sentiment was poor across other IT stocks as well. TCS closed 5.47 per cent down, both Wipro and Mphasis lost 4.10 per cent each and Tech Mahindra shed 3 per cent.

Led by massive sell-off in these stocks, the BSE IT index closed down 8.76 per cent at 5,404.27 and was the biggest loser among the 13 sectoral indices today.

Analysts said that the biggest disappointment was Infosys' revenue guidance for the next year, which is taken as a benchmark for the IT industry as a whole.

Infosys gave lower-than-expected revenue guidance of $7,553 million-7,692 million, representing a full-year growth of 8-10 per cent. This is incidentally lower than industry body Nasscom's estimate 11-14 per cent growth estimate for the Indian software services industry in FY13.

"The future dollar revenue guidance was muted and was even below the standard industry projection. This has led to selling pressure in the stock," Ashika Brokers Research Head Paras Bothra said.

Infosys was the biggest laggard for market sentiments as the bellwether stock alone contributed 202 points to the overall fall in the Sensex, which settled the day 1.37 per cent lower at 17,094.5 points.

"Infosys numbers were lower than market expectations. Moreover, the company gave discouraging guidance for coming quarters and FY13, which acted as big dampener for the market sentiments," Shanu Goel Research Analyst Bonanza Portfolio said.

Earlier in the day, Infosys posted 27.4 per cent rise in Q4 profit but could not meet its own revenue estimates for the fourth quarter ended March 31, and has projected below-average growth for this fiscal by forecasting tough times ahead for the entire sector.

The company said challenging global economic scenario was taking a toll on technology budgets of the clients, which could adversely affect IT companies this fiscal, 2012-13, after the difficult time seen last quarter.