Firm global indices keep market buoyant

The market exhibited strong optimism, as buoyancy in overseas markets triggered a major across-the-board rally. After registering heavy loss on yesterday's trade, the Sensex resumed with a positive gap of 231 points at 13,581. However, lack of new buying in heavyweights kept the Sensex range-bound. But, in the afternoon trades the Sensex scaled up on hectic buying and set another all-time high of 13,998. Firm close in other Asian indices also helped the market rally. The Sensex finally closed the session with gains of 615 points at 13,964. The Nifty closed by adding 169 points at 4,157.

Among the sectoral indices, the BSE Realty led the upsurge with gains of 6.06% at 4,901 followed by the BSE Power (up 5.39% at 2,456), BSE Bankex Index (up 4.87% at 6,183) and BSE CG Index (up 4.70% at 11,365). However, the market breadth was positive. Of the 2,726 stocks traded on the BSE 2,131 stocks advanced, 527 stocks advanced and 68 stocks ended unchanged.

All the 30 Sensex stocks managed to end in the green. Reliance Energy was the leading gainer and soared 10.66% at Rs835.45. Jaiprakash Associates jumped 7.49% at Rs404.55, ITC shot up by 6.78% at Rs171.85, Reliance Communications advanced 6.15% at Rs440.95, Tata Consultancy Services moved up by 5.92% at Rs875.65, HDFC Bank added 5.72% at Rs1,058, BHEL gained 5.14% at Rs1,575.30 and Reliance Industries gained 5.12% at Rs2,079.95. The remaining sensex stocks were up over 1-4% each.

Over 2.58 crore Reliance Natural Resources shares changed hands on the BSE followed by IFCI (1.86 crore shares), Idea Cellular (1.26 crore shares), Indusind Bank (1.04 crore shares) and Ispat Industries (0.94 crore shares).