Gains pared

The market pared gains in late afternoon trade after the BSE 30-share Sensex hit an all-time high. The market breadth remained negative. The mid-cap and small-cap indices declined. Banking stocks were weak. IT stocks slipped further.Asian markets ended mixed, while European markets were trading up.

The market galloped in mid-afternoon trade, propelling the Sensex to its all-time high. Reliance Industries extended gains.

Remaining range bound in mid-afternoon trade, the market surfed in the positive and negative zones. Extending gains, the market had hit a new intra-day high in mid-morning trade.

At 15:57 IST, the Sensex was up 7 points, or 0.01%, to 17,954.15 in mid-afternoon trade. It opened with a gap of 54.54 points at 17,779.22 . The Sensex touched an all-time high of 17979.18 in mid-morning trade and a low of 17,731.14 in early afternoon trade.

The S&P CNX Nifty was down 21.8 points, or 0.42%, to 5,186.85. It had hit a high of 5,248.55 in mid-afternoon trade, and a low of 5,173.75 in early afternoon trade.

Of the 30 shares of the Sensex, seven had moved up, while the remaining were trading down. The market breadth was weak on BSE: 955 scrips had advanced, 1,760 declined, while 367 remained unchanged.

The BSE Mid-Cap index was down 85.13 points, or 1.12%, to 7,494.14 underperforming the Sensex,. The BSE Small-Cap index down 30.03 points, or 0.33%, to 9,111.89, underperforming the Sensex.

India's wholesale price index (WPI) rose 3.42 % in the 12 months to 22 September 2007, higher than previous week's 3.23 %, due to a rise in manufactured product prices, data released today, 5 October 2007, showed. Banking stocks declined as WPI was more than expected. SBI (down 1.86% to Rs 1,865), ICICI Bank (down 1.35% to Rs 1,047) and HDFC Bank (down 0.44% to Rs 1,398) edged lower. HDFC declined 1.71% to Rs 2,452.10.

Reliance Communications (up 2.13% to Rs 648) and Bharti Airtel (up 3.42% to Rs 994) were among the major gainers in the Sensex pack.

NTPC (down 4.37% to Rs 216.50 and the top loser from the Sensex pack), Hindalco Industries (down 2.55% to Rs 171.40), Tata Steel (down 2.77% to Rs 840.80) and ITC (down 3% to Rs 179.25) and ACC (down 2.58% to Rs 1,183) were the major losers from the Sensex pack.

IT bigwigs declined as the rupee gained further. Infosys (down 0.41% to Rs 1,988) ,TCS (down 0.8% to Rs 1,070), Wipro (down 0.55% to Rs 458.75) and Satyam Computer Services (down 0.94% to Rs 446.50) were weak.

The BSE Capital Goods index was the major gainer from the sectoral indices. L&T (up 6.62% to Rs 3,087.95, hitting an all-time high of Rs 3,197.50 today and the top gainer from Sensex pack), Bhel (up 3.03% to Rs 2,155 , hitting an all-time high of Rs 2,229 today) and Suzlon Energy (up 0.66% to Rs 1,650) advanced.

The largest private sector company and oil refiner Reliance Industries rose 2.79% to Rs 2,490.05. It touched an all-time high of Rs 2,539 today on reports it may join state-run firms to set up a Rs 6000-crore petrochemicals complex in Visakapatnam i n Andhra Pradesh.

Power transmission firm Power Grid Corporation of India was trading at Rs 101.40 on BSE on its debut, a premium of 94.71% over the IPO price of Rs 52.

Among the side counters, Phoenix International (up 19.83% to Rs 20.85) Tata Sponge Iron (up 20% to Rs 234.95), Artson Engineering (up 20% to Rs 57.35), and OCL India (up 20% to Rs 192.40) had advanced and were the major gainers.

Solectrun Centum (down 20.68% to Rs 221.10) and Ras Resorts (down 14.45% to Rs 37) were the major losers.

Asian markets, which opened before the Indian markets, were trading mixed today. Taiwan's Taiwan Weighted (down 0.11% to 9,617.26) and Japan's Nikkei (down 0.16% at 17,065.04) were in red. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng (up 3.18% to 27,831.52) and Singapore's Straits Times (up 1.03% to 3,822.62) were in positive territory.

Most of the European markets were trading in green. These included France’s CAC (down 0.03% to 5,802.88) edged lower. Germany’s DAX (up 0.14% to 7,956.30) and UK’s FTSE 100 (up 0.21% to 6,561.70).

American markets rose marginally on Thursday, 4 October 2007. The Dow Jones Industrial Average index ended up 6.26 points to 13,974.31 points and Nasdaq up 4.14 points to 2,733.57. US stocks barely rose on Thursday as investors shied away from making big bets before the release of the jobs data on Friday, 5 October 2007, to shed light on the economy and the outlook for interest rates. The American earnings season goes in full force in another one week.

Provisionally, as per NSE data, foreign institutional investors (FIIs) were net buyers of Rs 457.28-crore equities, while domestic institutional investors (DII) were net sellers of Rs 663.9-crore equities on Thursday, 4 October 2007.

The market snapped its 10-day winning streak on 4 October 2007 as the Sensex ended down 69.90 points, or 0.39%, to 17,777.14 points. The S&P CNX Nifty closed lower 2.15 points, or 0.04%, to 5,208.65. It had touched a low of 5,126.05 in mid-afternoon trade.

Till then, the market had been on a roll, with the Sensex hitting a record high in the trading sessions from 19 September 2007 to 3 October 2007. Heavy FII buying and hopes of a further cut in interest rates by the US Federal Reserve at its next policy meeting on 30-31 October 2007 had boosted the bourses.

From a low of 13,989.11 on 21 August 2007, the Sensex has galloped a whopping 3,857.93 points, or 27.57%, to 17,847.04 on Wednesday, 3 October 2007.