Market holds firm above 13400

he market witnessed substantial volatility for a major portion of the trading session, but held firm above the 13400 level as global indices created a perfect platform for the bulls to pursue buying. The Sensex resumed 41 points higher at 13440 and advanced further on substantial buying support. Buying in heavyweight, tech and banking stocks propelled the index to a new intra-day high of 13487 in the afternoon. However, the market slipped twice in the afternoon on the weakness in select heavyweight, FMCG, metal and consumer durables stocks, which dragged the index to an intra-day low of 13381. The Sensex finally wrapped up the session with gains of 26 points at 13425, while the Nifty added seven points to close at 3866.

The market breadth was negative, with the losers outpacing the gainers in the ratio of 1:0.58. Of the 2,613 stocks traded on the BSE, 933 stocks advanced, 1,619 stocks declined and 65 stocks ended unchanged. Among the sectoral indices the BSE IT index was the major gainer and soared 1.87% at 4986 followed by the BSE TECk index (up 1.04% at 3415) and the BSE Bankex (up 1.03% at 6864).

Among the front-line stocks TCS was the major gainer and was up 2.95% at Rs1,106. Infosys soared 2.26% at 2,210, ICICI Bank gained 2.01% at Rs857, Satyam surged 1.39% at Rs432, ONGC advanced 1.04% at Rs880 and Ranbaxy was up 1.04% at Rs402. Bharti Airtel, L&T, HDFC Bank Wipro and Bajaj Auto also ended in positive territory. However, HLL lost ground and tumbled 1.86% at Rs248, while NTPC shed 1.85% at Rs135. Hindalco was down 1.81% at Rs179. Grasim, ACC, Gujarat Ambuja, Maruti, Hero Honda, BHEL and Reliance Communication shed over 1% each. Cipla, SBI, ITC, RIL, Tata Motors, Dr Reddy's, HDFC and REL also ended the day in negative territory.

Over 1.01 crore Silverline Technologies shares changed hands on the BSE followed by TCS (88.93 lakh shares), Development Credit Bank (69.95 lakh shares), Nandan Exim (67.03 lakh shares) and GTL Infrastructure (51.89 lakh shares).

Value-wise TCS registered a turnover of Rs943.40 crore on the BSE followed by Indiabulls (Rs209.29 crore), Glenmark Pharma (Rs116.01 crore), Hindustan Zinc (Rs113.96 crore) and Infosys (Rs113.48 crore).