Despite volatility throughout the year owing to domestic and global factors including the general elections and the US-China trade war, the market managed to hit all-time high levels multiple times in 2019. The latest was on November 28, when the Sensex hit an all-time high of 41,163.79 and the Nifty touched 12,158.80.

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For 2019, the Sensex has gained over 12 percent while the Nifty has added 10 percent.

Despite the fact that the market has touched all-time highs multiple times, the BSE500 index shows more declines than advances in 2019. This is because major gains in the year were led by a rally in large-cap stocks as analysts remained cautious over midcaps and smallcaps after a number of companies defaulted in 2019.

The losers

320 stocks in the BSE500 index gave negative returns in 2019 with more than 40 stocks losing half of their investors' wealth. Major defaulters like Reliance Capital, Dewan Housing, Reliance Communications (RCom), Reliance Infra, Reliance Power, Jain Irrigation, Coffee Day Enterprises, and HSIL lost over 80 percent this year on increase in loan defaults and pledged shares.

Other losers that cracked over 50 percent included SREI Infra Finance, Lakshmi Vilas Bank, CG Power, Yes Bank, PC Jeweller, Thomas Cook, Eveready Industries, Indiabulls Ventures, Allahabad Bank, and Suzlon Energy.

Debt-ridden Reliance Capital tanked over 95 percent in 2019 amid loan defaults and delay in interest repayment.

Dewan Housing Finance Corporation Ltd (DHFL) fell 94 percent on loan defaults resulting in rating downgrades. DHFL became the first financial services company to be admitted to the bankruptcy courts. Early this month, RBI suspended the board of the company and appointed a committee to help recover Rs 84,000 crore that the company owed to different lenders.

Here are the top 10 losers from the BSE500 in 2019:

The gainers

Among gainers, 180 stocks gave positive returns with 33 stocks rising over 50 percent on a year-to-date basis. Despite roadblocks, Adani Green Energy managed to surge over 200 percent in 2019. 4 other stocks including Aavas Financiers, Reliance Nippon AMC, CreditAccess Grameen, and HDFC AMC doubled investor wealth.

Bata India, Pfizer, MCX India, Dr Lal Pathlabs, Abbott India, SEF, Indraprastha Gas also advanced over 50 percent for the year.

Other gainers included Manappuram Finance, InfoEdge, Adani Transmission, Gujarat Gas, ICICI Prudential, PI Industries, Bharti Airtel, Relaxo Footwears, and Bajaj Finance.

Adani Green, which is a subsidiary of the Adani Group and is one of the largest renewable power generation companies in India, rallied over 200 percent on strong fundamentals and robust earnings during the year. In Q2, the company posted a net profit of Rs 102 crore profit for the September quarter of 2019-20. It had reported a loss of Rs 188 crore in the year-ago period, a BSE filing said.

Aavas Financiers, which was listed in 2019 itself, rose over 100 percent on the back of strong financial performance and sustained buying by foreign portfolio investors (FPIs).

Here are the top 10 gainers from the BSE500 in 2019: