Market retreats after testing 14000

Sensex Open:14028 High:14028 Low:13916

The Sensex touched an all-time of 14028 with gains of 154 points in early trades. However the market lost some of its initial momentum and was range-bound with a positive bias for the rest of the session. The index witnessed profit taking in the afternoon and touched an intra-day low of 13906. The Sensex ended the trading session with gains of 63 points at 13938, while the Nifty advanced 15 points to close at 4016.

The breadth of the market was marginally positive. Of the 2,653 stocks traded on the BSE, 1,321 stocks advanced, 1,265 stocks declined and 67 stocks ended unchanged. The BSE Metal index led the sectoral indices chart with gains of 2.01% followed by the BSE Oil & Gas index (up 1.02%), the BSE IT index (up 1.00%), the BSE CG index (up 0.80%) and the BSE FMCG index (up 0.26%).

Leading the rally, Tata Steel surged 5.30% at Rs493. Reliance Communication gained 3.43% at Rs458, L&T added 2.83% at Rs1,462, Reliance Industries advanced 1.58% at Rs1,280 and Infosys was up 1.52% at Rs2,239. Among the other gainers Parsvanath surged 5.37% at Rs522, Polaris soared 5.04% at Rs131 and Ingersoll Rand rose 4.59% at Rs382. IndusInd Bank, Jet Airways, i-flex, Nestle, Federal Bank, Castrol, IPCL and MRPL advanced 3-4% each.

Metal stocks had a good run on the bourses. Maharashtra Seamless vaulted 2.50% at Rs478, Sesa Goa gained 2.31% at Rs1289, SAIL added 1.98% at Rs88, Jindal Steel advanced 1.83% at Rs2,182 and Hindalco was up 1.12% at Rs175. However, Jindal Saw declined 2.16% at Rs412 and Sterlite Industries dropped 1.90% at Rs578.

Parsvnath was the most actively traded counter on the BSE with trades of over 49.25 lakh shares followed by Lanco Infratech (18.73 lakh shares), Tata Steel (16.77 lakh shares), Reliance Communication (15.65 lakh shares) and ITC (14.09 lakh shares).