FII inflows cross $3 billion mark on Dalal Street

It's raining dollars in the Indian stock market with the overseas investment on the local bourses crossing three-billion dollars mark since the beginning of this year.

Foreign Institutional Investors have put in a net of 3.05 billion dollars (over Rs 13,500 crore) in the Indian stocks so far in 2007, while taking their total net investment in the country so far to over 52 billion dollars.

However, the net FII inflows in the first four months of 2007 is over a billion dollars, less than the figure invested in the same period of the previous year.

More than half of the net investment by FIIs this year came in the month of April alone after the overseas investors returned to the bourses with positive sentiments as Sensex regained its once-lost 14,000 level.

The bourses had witnessed a herd-like flight of FIIs after a sharp fall in February this year, but with the corporate earnings results meeting or beating expectations, the sentiments have improved considerably, said a broker.

According to the data available with the market regulator SEBI, FIIs purchased stocks worth close to Rs 46,400 crore and sold stocks worth about Rs 39,500 crore in April 2007, taking their net investment to about Rs 6,900 crore (about 1.56 billion dollars).

However, the net FII investment for January-April period is estimated to remain around three-billion dollar level, as against about 3.3 billion dollars in the same period of 2006, said another broker.

FIIs had purchased stocks worth a net of about eight billion dollars in entire 2006, as against a record high of 10.7 billion dollars in 2005.