Sensex rebounds as IT stocks outperform

The market witnessed a sharp pull-back after witnessing a slump in the afternoon. The rally was mainly triggered by the buoyancy in heavyweights, IT, banking and realty stocks. Firm openings in European markets also helped the Sensex to rally. The Sensex resumed with a positive gap of 268 points at 20,064 but slipped gradually as trading progressed and entered in negative territory by the afternoon. The Sensex touched the day's low of 19,706 on profit bookings in front-line, consumer durables and metal stocks. However, hectic buying in technology and banking stocks thereafter, saw the Sensex recover most of its losses and enter into green again. The Sensex finally closed the session at 19,966, up 170 points. The Nifty closed by adding 20 points at 5,974.

The breadth of the market was neutral. Of the 2,909 stocks traded on the BSE 1,460 stocks advanced, 1,406 stocks declined and 43 stocks ended unchanged. Among the sectoral indices the BSE IT Index flared up by 3.69%, the BSE Teck Index rose 2.73%, the BSE Bankex Index moved up by 2.43% and the BSE Realty Index was up 2.02%.

Among the Sensex stocks, Infosys flared up 5.09% at Rs1,718, DLF shot up by 4.13% at Rs1,011, ICICI Bank zoomed 4.02% at Rs1,248, HDFC moved up by 3.82% at Rs2,921, TCS scaled up 2.62% at Rs1,061, Ranbaxy surged by 2.34% at Rs407, Reliance Communication jumped by 2.17% at Rs734 and Bharti Airtel gained 2.10% at Rs960.

Over 3.69 crore Ispat Industries shares changed hands on the BSE followed by Centurian Bank of Punjab (2.51 crore shares), IFCI (1.79 crore shares), Tata Teleservices (1.58 crore shares) and Reliance Natural Resources (1.25 crore shares).

Value-wise, Ispat Industries clocked a turnover of Rs258 crore followed by Reliance Petroleum (Rs235 crore), Reliance Natural Resources (Rs221 crore), IFCI (Rs182 crore) and Reliance Industries (Rs182 crore).