Sensex recoups part of early losses

MUMBAI, JUNE 18. Led by Infosys Technologies, stocks staged a dramatic recovery at the fag end aiding the Sensex recoup major part of its losses on the opening day of the new account on the Bombay Stock Exchange today on sizable late purchases by foreign institutional investors.

The FIIs, who were net sellers in the last settlement period and mostly remained sidelined at the initial stages, reportedly made heavy purchases in key heavyweights such as Infosys, ITC, Zee Telefilms, MTNL and a few others.

Reflecting the turnaround, the BSE benchmark 30-share index rallied smartly and bounced back from the day's low of 3295.34 to close at 3353.11 against last Friday's close of 3372.94, showing a net loss of 19.83 points. The BSE-100 index eased by 9.94 points to 1633 from 1642.94.

Attributing the early setback in equities to increased selling pressure by local operators, market sources said the decision by the National Stock Exchange to raise the existing margins on ALBM to 40 per cent from 17.5 per cent for the two settlement periods forced investors and speculators to square up positions before the ban on carry-forward trading comes into effect on July 2.

Had it not been for heavy selling by domestic financial institutions in Indian stocks, particularly the heavyweight counter Reliance Industries that closed with a sharp fall, the Sensex would have ended in the positive territory.

In the specified group, 124 including 18 index-based countered registered moderate losses while 49 others finished marked falls.

The BSE-200 and the Dollex were quoted down at 360.37 and 127.68 against 362.66 and 128.46 respectively. The BSE-500 dropped by 6.97 points to 1633 from 1642.94.

The volume of business was extremely low at Rs. 1,092.92 crores. Infosys Technologies were the top traded scrip with highest turnover of Rs. 149.54 crores followed by Digital Equipment (Rs. 104.54 crores), Wipro (Rs. 89.05 crores), Reliance Industries (Rs. 84.45 crores) and Satyam Computer (Rs. 72.58 crores).

- PTI

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