PTI reported that the country's top 10 firms lost over INR 21,000 crore from their market capitalization in February. The coveted club of country's most valued 10 firms, comprising of 4 private entities and 6 public companies lost a combined INR 21,549 crore during the month to end at INR 10,23,135 crore.

The top 4 companies namely RIL, NTPC, ONGC and Bharti Airtel managed to maintain the January rankings in terms of market cap last month as well.

Reliance Industries alone accounted for close to half of the value erosion from the elite club. RIL saw its valuation dipping to INR 199,094 crore at the end of February from INR 208,559.98 crore on January 30th 2009.

NTPC, even after losing INR 4,370 crore from its market cap remained at second position, while ONGC and private sector telecom service provider Bharti Airtel added INR 7,048 crore and INR 532 crore, respectively in their market valuation to settle at third and fourth position.

Meanwhile, MMTC, diversified conglomerate ITC and BHEL jumped up from their last month position to notch 5, 6 and 8 position at the end of the month. It lost INR 2,115 crore in a month, while ITC and BHEL added a combined nearly INR 5,000 crore to their market valuation.

Besides, companies which lost their last month's positions were IT bellwether Infosys Technologies, country's largest public sector lender SBI and largest iron ore producer NMDC. These 3 companies saw an erosion of over INR 18,138 crore from their market valuation.

Apart from the list of top 10 most valued firms, 2 private sector lenders ICICI Bank and HDFC Bank witnessed a combined erosion of over INR 11,506 crore from its valuation during the month. While, ICICI Bank saw its valuation plummeting by INR 9,819 crore to INR 36,526 crore, HDFC Bank lost INR 1,688 crore to INR 37,637 crore at the end of trade.

(Sourced from Press Trust of India)