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Sensex gains 67.59 points to cross 3900 mark

Pivotals recovered sharply on the Bombay Stock Exchange on Monday, the inaugural day of the new trading settlement and the first day after the inauguration of the BOLT-Net expansion, following good buying support from domestic institutional investors coupled with moderate purchases by speculators and foreign institutional investors.

Mirroring the trend, the BSE Sensex opened on a weak note at 3875.26, declined to the day's low of 3854.21, and at the end of the session it crossed the psychological barrier of 3900 points to touch the day's high of 3948.92, and closed at 3943.67 points, showing a net gain of 67.59 points over the previous close of 3876.08 points.

Similarly, the BSE-100 index registered an impressive gain of 25.70 points to 1720.46 points against the previous close of 1694.76 points. The BSE-200 and dollex indices moved up by 5.06 and 2.22 points to 385.10 and 176.29 points against the previous close of 380.04 and 174.02 points respectively.

Marketmen said that the Unit Trust of India reportedly made heavy purchases in the blue chip counters like Reliance, State Bank of India, MTNL, ITC and Hindustan Lever during the course of trading.

The FIIs and speculators too made moderate purchases at the fundamentally strong counters, they said.

Leading BSE brokers said that they are happy with the countrywide expansion of the BOLT network which will increase business volume on the country's premier and oldest bourse.

However, according to market sources, the BOLT will become operational only after a fortnight period.

The total turnover reported during the day amounted to Rs 8.8 bmillion.

Market leader Reliance Industries stood first in the list of turnover by registering highest turnover of Rs 2.1 billion, followed by State Bank of India Rs 1.7 billion, ITC Rs 1.6 billion, Tata Tea Rs 705.5 million and Castrol Rs 298.2 million.

Hectic trading acticity was also observed at the other counters like TELCO Rs 248.7 million, TISCO Rs 245.7 million, MTNL Rs 200.8 million, ACC Rs 181.7 million, Guj Amb Rs 140 million, Colgate Rs 920 million, BSES Rs 86.2 million, L&T Rs 85.3 million, GE Shipping Rs 70.4 million and Hind Lever Rs 65.5 million.

National Stock Exchange

After a better start, pivotals registered nominal losses at the National Stock Exchange on Monday following a lack of buying support from major market players.

Mirroring the trend, the NSE-50 index opened at 1105.45, touched the day's high of 1115.00, declined to the day's low of 1097.95 points, and later closed at 1104.70, showing a loss of 0.30 points over the previous close of 1105.00 points.

The midcap index moved down by 3.70 points to 1251.45 points against the previous close of 1255.15 points.

The total turnover on the NSE reported during the day amounted to Rs 16.43 billion.

Tobacco giant ITC topped the list of turnover by registering highest turnover of Rs 4.9 billion, followed by Reliance Rs 3.3 billion, SBI Rs 2.6 billion, Tata Tea Rs 1.6 billion, and ACC Rs 509 million.

Hectic activity was observed at the other counters like TELCO Rs 403.7 million, TISCO Rs 341.7 million, Larsen and Toubro Rs 272.8 million, Gujarat Ambuja Cement Rs 207.8 million, Colgate Rs 170.7 million, MTNL Rs 137.9 million, BSES Rs 101 million, IPCL Rs 99.5 million, Rel Capital Rs 96.8 million, Hind Lever Rs 91.1 million, Dr Reddy Rs 77.5 million, BHEL Rs 68.5 million, ONGC Rs 66.7 million, IFCI Rs 60.2 million, Bajaj Auto Rs 55.7 million, ICICI Rs 43.9 million, Satyam Comp Rs 43.3 million, Tata Power Rs 43.1 million, and Ranbaxy Rs 38.8 million.

The top five gainers were GE Shipping, IFCI, ITC Reliance and TELCO. The top five losers were Orient Bank, IPCL, MRPL, Tata Power and Ranbaxy.

UNI