Sensex ends buoyant

The correction took a back seat with the bulls providing healthy support to the otherwise gloomy market. The market remained firm throughout the session. The Sensex took a cue from the firm Asian markets and resumed with a positive gap of 33 points at 14124. However some selling pressure saw it dip and touch an intra-day low of 14110. The market rallied in the afternoon to touch the day's high at 14278 on substantial buying in banking, consumer durables, metals and tech stocks. The Sensex finally ended the session with gains of 176 points at 14267, while the Nifty closed at 4137, up 54 points.

The breadth of the market was neutral. Of the 2,692 stocks traded on the BSE, 1,336 stocks advanced, 1,313 stocks declined and 43 stocks ended unchanged. All the sectoral indices ended in the green. The BSE CD index advanced 2.47% at 3895 followed by the BSE Bankex (up 2.11% at 7413), the BSE Metal index (up 1.65% at 9436) and the BSE Teck index (up 1.64% at 3810).

Select heavyweights notched up significant gains. SBI surged 5.72% at Rs1,203, Hindalco soared 3.95% at Rs183, Bharti Airtel climbed 3.41% at Rs732, Tata Motors advanced 3.18% at Rs906, Reliance Communication gained 2.78% at Rs474, NTPC added 2.64% at Rs146, HDFC Bank jumped 2.23% at Rs1,102, Reliance Energy gained 2.12% at Rs525, Gujarat Ambuja added 1.60% at Rs139 and Wipro was up 1.55% at Rs622. Among the laggards Tata Steel slipped 1.34% at Rs458. BHEL, HLL, HDFC, Grasim and Bajaj Auto ended with marginal losses.

Banking stocks were in the limelight. Punjab National Bank soared 3.74% at Rs527, Andhra Bank jumped 2.90% at Rs91, Bank of India added 2.78% at Rs196, Oriental Bank advanced 2.52% at Rs221 and Bank of Baroda gained 2.06% at Rs255. Among the consumer durables stocks Rajesh Exports soared 4.99% at Rs458. Titan Industries, Lloyd Electric, Videocon Industries, Gitanjali Gems and Blue Star gained 1-3% each.

Over 44.51 lakh Tata Steel shares changed hands on the BSE followed by SAIL (42.29 lakh shares), Exide Industries (40.05 lakh shares), IDFC (34.45 lakh shares) and IDBI (27.49 lakh shares).

Value-wise Tata Steel registered a turnover of Rs203 crore on the BSE followed by SBI (Rs145 crore), Reliance Communication (Rs79 crore), SAIL (Rs46 crore) and Satyam Computers (Rs44 crore).