Nifty slips for third straight day; should you short sell in this market?

Benchmark equity indices witnessed profit booking for the third straight session on Thursday following weak global cues. The 30-share Sensex closed 379 points, or 0.73%, down at 51324.69, while the 50-share Nifty index settled nearly 90 points, or 0.59%, down at 15,118.

Most analysts are hopeful that this is just a corrective decline in an ongoing uptrend. Therefore, they are not suggesting any short-selling considering the present market condition.

Manish Shah, Founder, Niftytriggers.com

Nifty has now hit the T-Line which is an 8-period moving average and this line can act as a support. In the last three days, Nifty has not seen a range expansion candle and the decline has been on less than normal ranged candles. There is no urgency of selling visible on the index. Weight of evidence indicates that we are in a corrective decline in an ongoing trend.

Nifty has a support level at 15,000-14,950 and this is the zone from where there could be buying coming in the index. On the upside, Nifty has a short term resistance at 15,250. A break above 15,250-15,275 zone would mean a signal that Nifty has resumed its primary trend. On the way up expect the index to rally towards 15,500-15,560. We would not be selling short in these conditions but will fully be on a lookout for buying opportunities.

Shrikant Chouhan, Executive Vice-President, Equity Technical Research at Kotak Securities

On the day of the weekly expiration of index options, the benchmark index witnessed profit booking. We are of the view that the market likely to continue the narrow range activity and PSU Banks and selective midcap and smallcap stocks will outperform in the near future.

Technical, on daily charts index, maintain higher bottom series formation and the texture of the market suggests uptrend likely to continue if the Nifty and Sensex succeed to trade above 15,050/51,000.

On the flip side, dismissal of 15,060 would result in further weakness and in that case, Nifty/Sensex could retest previous lows of 14,970/50,840.

Jay Thakkar, VP and Head of Equity Research, Marwadi Shares and Finance Ltd.

The weightage of public sector enterprises is less compared to the private sector hence there has been selling pressure on the overall market. Nifty has crucial support at 15,000 levels whereas Bank Nifty has crucial support at 36,000 levels, so till these levels are held there can be some bounce back which can help both of these indices to retrace its three days sell-off, however, failing to hold the above-mentioned levels could lead to a medium-term reversal as well.