Sensex slips after a five-session rally

Continuing its upward move for the sixth straight session the Sensex opened with a positive gap of 32 points at 13222 on the back of positive global cues. The Sensex touched the day's high of 13295 amid some volatility in the heavyweights. The index struggled to make headway in the afternoon. Sustained selling in banking, pharma and information technology stocks towards the close pulled down the Sensex to an intra-day low of 13161. The Sensex managed to pare some losses and ended the session at 13183, down six points. The Nifty closed at 3863, up 14 points.

The breadth of the market was positive. Of the 2,632 stocks traded on the BSE, 1,531 stocks advanced, 1,037 stocks declined and 64 stocks ended unchanged. Among the sectoral indices the BSE Metal Index advanced by 3.68% at 9331 followed by the BSE CG Index (up 1.11% at 9342). However, the BSE Bankex, the BSE HC Index, the BSE IT Index, the BSE Teck Index and the BSE FMCG Index closed in negative territory.

Very few Sensex stocks moved up significantly. Hindalco surged 4.40% at Rs142, Tata Steel advanced 3.29% at Rs512, Bharti Airtel added 1.24% at Rs774, BHEL rose 1.22% at Rs2,493 and Cipla gained 1.07% at Rs236. ONGC, Bajaj Auto, ITC, Reliance Industries and NTPC closed with marginal gains. Among the laggards Ranbaxy tumbled 3.49% at Rs345, Dr Reddy's slipped 2.59% at Rs701, ACC was down 1.98% at Rs731 and HDFC dropped 1.55% at Rs1,583. Reliance Communications, Gujarat Ambuja, HDFC Bank, SBI and Satyam Computers ended with marginal losses.

Metal stocks were in the limelight. Shree Precoated soared 10% at Rs343, Nalco surged 6.43% at Rs247, Sterlite Industries added 5.70% at Rs506, Jindal Steel advanced 4.73% at Rs2,601 and SAIL gained 4.29% at Rs123. Maharashtra Seamless, Hindustan Zinc and Jindal Saw were up 3-4% each.

Over 1.31 crore Reliance Natural Resources shares changed hands on the BSE followed by IFCI (1.28 crore shares), Gremach Infrastructure (1.03 crore shares), India Bulls Real Estate (63.80 lakh shares) and SAIL (52.41 lakh shares).

Value-wise India Bulls Real Estate registered a turnover of Rs190 crore on the BSE followed by India Bulls (Rs171 crore), Mindtree (Rs136 crore), Tata Steel (Rs133 crore) and BHEL (Rs99 crore).