Weak heavyweights drag down the market

After adding 53 points in early trades, the Sensex eased and slipped further in the afternoon on the back of weak Asian indices. Profit booking in the heavyweights Satyam Computers, Ranbaxy and Wipro triggered a major slump and the Sensex slipped to the day's low of 14068. Select buying towards the close saw the Sensex pare some losses and end the session at 14183, down 35 points. The Nifty shed 19 points and closed at 4090.

The market breadth was weak. Of the 2,671 stocks traded on the BSE, 1,619 stocks declined, 1,008 stocks advanced and 44 stocks ended unchanged. Among the sectoral indices the BSE IT index shed 1.82% at 5310 while the BSE Auto index declined 1.29% at 5620. However, the BSE FMCG index and the BSE Bankex were up 0.81% and 0.28% respectively.

Select heavyweights declined sharply on strong selling pressure. Satyam Computers tanked 5.30% at Rs488, Ranbaxy dropped 3.66% at Rs414, Wipro fell 3.07% at Rs621, Reliance Energy shed 2.58% at Rs515, Cipla declined 2.23% at Rs253, Bajaj Auto dipped 1.94% at Rs2,730 and Tata Steel slumped 1.67% at Rs468. BHEL, TCS, L&T and NTPC shed over 1% each. Among the select gainers Reliance Communication advanced 2.34% at Rs447, Gujarat Ambuja Cements added 2.17% at Rs148, ITC gained 2.04% at Rs175 and ICICI Bank was up 1.41% at Rs986.

Select information technology and pharma stocks witnessed considerable selling pressure. Tech Mahindra slumped 6.82% at Rs1,771 and Financial Technologies declined 3.50% at Rs1,801. Among the pharma stocks Nicholas Piramal lost 2.33% at Rs266, Lupin fell 2.17% at Rs562 and Orchid Chemicals was down 1.96% at Rs208.

However, select FMCG stocks attracted buying support. Nestle gained 3.52% at Rs1,123, Proctor & Gamble moved up by 2.33% at Rs912 and ITC added 2.04% at Rs175.

Over 41.47 lakh MTNL shares changed hands on the BSE followed by Satyam Computers (26.92 lakh shares), IDBI (25.04 lakh shares), Dena Bank (22.37 lakh shares) and Ashok Leyland (21.63 lakh shares).

Value-wise Reliance Industries registered a turnover of Rs176 crore on the BSE followed by Satyam Computers (Rs131 crore), MTNL (Rs68.64 crore) and Reliance Communication (Rs65.25 crore).