Investor wealth plummets by Rs 36,50,000 crore in 9 months

The turmoil in the global markets has taken its toll on investors in domestic bourses which have suffered a loss of over Rs 36,50,000 crore in nine months since the benchmark Sensex scaled its life-time high on January 10. Country's most valued firm, Reliance Industries witnessed its market capitalisation fall to less than half to just Rs 2,39,804.62 crore at the end of trading on Wednesday from Rs 4,40,046.42 crore on January 10. The total investor wealth, measured in terms of market capitalisation of all the listed companies together, dipped to about Rs 36,50,000 crore on October 8 -- as against close to Rs 73,00,000 crore on January 10, when the benchmark Sensex scaled its life-time high before embarking on a southward journey. In the dollar terms, the loss has been even bigger as rupee has also depreciated sharply against the US currency. The cumulative market capitalisation of Indian companies stood at 1.8 trillion dollars on January 10, which today came down to 760 billion dollars, as rupee fell from 39.26 per dollar to near 48-level today. Other blue chip firms which lost heavily during the nine months period include ONGC whose market cap dropped by over Rs 70,000 crore in the period and telecom major Bharti Airtel's witnessed a loss of over Rs 44,000 crore in the period under review. While country's largest lender SBI has lost close to Rs 69,000 crore in its market capitalisation since the peak in January till October 8. The 30-share index, on Wednesday, fell to as low as 10,750.76 points -- its lowest in more than two years --before ending the day at 11,328.26 points after some recovery. In the overall loss of close to Rs 36,50,000 crore, the company promoters have seen an erosion of over Rs 20,00,000 crore with their holding of about 60 per cent. After promoters, FIIs have taken the biggest hit with a loss of over Rs 4,00,000 crore, while retail investors have lost more than Rs 3,00,000 crore. The banks, mutual funds and insurance companies have also seen the value of their holdings plunge by close to Rs 3,00,000 crore. Attributing the fall in stock markets to happenings in the US and other Asian markets, Finance Minister P Chidambaram has cautioned against any hasty decisions by investors as fundamentals of the Indian economy are strong