• Budget speech completed. Finance Bill-II 2009 introduced.
• Customs duty on bio-diesel reduced.
• Gold and Silver to cost more.
• Excise duty on branded articles of jewellery to be reduced from 2% to Nil.
• Tax to be levied on Law Firms.
• Textile units to receive tax holiday.
• LCD TVs to cost less. Custom duty on LCD TVs cut from 10% to 5%.
• Set-Top Boxes to cost more. Customs duty of 5% on set-top boxes.

Have the stock markets turned around? The markets are appealing again. Both the benchmark indices - Sensex and Nifty have managed to get back to the previous prestigious levels; Sensex has touched 10000 mark and Nifty, 3200 mark.

The on-going rally prompts many questions. The foremost being - what are the reasons for the recent rally and how long will the recovery sustain? What are the indications of this rally? Has the bear phase has ended and is this the beginning of bulls phase again? Can small investors get back into the stock markets and trade in a big way?

Since last one year, there have been innumerable predictions about market conditions and economy. From the time Sensex has gone above 10000 points level recently, we have been quite skeptical whether this level sustains or not. We predict things in order to plan. There is every possibility that any of our predictions might turn upside down anytime. Nothing is perfectly predictable.