Market on a roll, 151 points up

The market continued with its awesome display for the fourth consecutive session and scaled new peaks on the back of an all-round buying support. Resuming on a firm note at 13734, 26 points above its previous close of 13708, the Sensex rallied sharply and zoomed above the 13900 mark to touch a new intra-day high of 13912 on a strong upmove in most of the index heavyweights and the other side counters. However, profit taking, particularly in select counters, towards the close saw the Sensex pare its gains considerably and close at 13860, up 151 points. The Nifty also edged higher and advanced 33 points to close at 3974.

The breadth of the market was slightly positive. Of the 2,705 stocks traded on the BSE, 1,354 stocks advanced, 1,259 stocks declined and 92 ended unchanged. Among the sectoral indices, the BSE Bankex , Auto, CD, HC, IT and the Tech indices rose by over 1% each, while the BSE CG, FMCG, Metal, Oil & Gas and PSU indices ended with steady gains.

Among the movers of the index, Satyam Computers soared 3.24% at Rs492, Tata Motors rose 2.54% at Rs907, HDFC Bank scaled up 2.53% at Rs1,057, ICICI Bank added 2.51% at Rs894, Gujarat Ambuja Cements moved up by 1.79% at Rs142, Wipro gained 1.66% at Rs607 and Reliance Communication was up 1.65% at Rs475. Infosys, Cipla and HDFC gained over 1% each. However, ONGC came under profit booking and lost 1.70% at Rs873, while Hero Honda declined 0.63% at Rs744. HLL, Reliance Energy, L&T and Maruti Udyog ended with marginal losses.

Mahindra & Mahindra at Rs899, Garware Offshore at Rs300.25, NCL Industries at Rs64.40, Modern India at Rs164.60, Simplex Trading at Rs93.95, Setco Auto at Rs173.25, Texmaco at Rs1,170.10 and Millars India at Rs143.65 touched new intra-day highs on the BSE.

Over 21.15 lakh EIH shares changed hands on the BSE followed by Reliance Communication (15.74 lakh shares), Sterling Biotech (15.55 lakh shares), Ashok Leyland (14.78 lakh shares) and IndusInd Bank (14.50 lakh shares).