Monday 25 February, 2008

Sensex ends up over 300pts, Reliance gains 5%

The Sensex opened with a huge positive gap of 175 points at 17,524. The index, however, could not hold gains and dropped to a low of 17,138 - down 386 points from the open - in late morning deals.

Buying at lower levels helped the index recoup the loss by mid-noon trades. The buying gained momentum in late noon trades, and the index rallied to a high of 17,674 - up 536 points from the day's low.

The Sensex finally ended with a gain of 302 points at 17,651.

The NSE Nifty surged 90 points to close at 5,201.

The BSE market breadth was negative - out of 2,740 stocks traded, 1,611 declined, 1,063 advanced and 66 were unchanged today.

INDEX MOVERS...

Reliance zoomed 5% to Rs 2,552. ACC gained 5.7% at Rs 818.

Ambuja Cements and Reliance Energy moved up nearly 4.5% each to Rs 123 and Rs 1,623, respectively.

Grasim, Maruti and Wipro rallied over 4% each to Rs 2,912, Rs 798 and Rs 440, respectively.

NTPC and Satyam gained 2.7% each at Rs 203 and Rs 450, respectively.

Hindalco and Ranbaxy moved up 2.5% each to Rs 197 and Rs 420, respectively.

Infosys advanced over 2% to Rs 1,613. ICICI Bank and ITC moved up 1% each to Rs 1,110 and Rs 202, respectively.

...AND THE SHAKERS

Bajaj Auto tumbled 4% to Rs 2,203.

STOCKS IN THE LIMELIGHT

Reliance Power gained 8% to end at Rs 450 - its IPO price - after the announcement of a 3:5 bonus issue on Sunday.

HDFC Bank dropped 3.5% to Rs 1,423 and Centurion Bank of Punjab slumped 14.5% to Rs 48.25 after the boards of both the banks approved a merger ratio of 1:29 today.

VALUE & VOLUME TOPPERS

Reliance Power topped the value chart with a turnover of Rs 782.25 crore followed by debutants Tulsi Extrusions (Rs 485 crore) and IRB Infrastructure (Rs 297 crore), Reliance Natural Resources (Rs 241.20 crore) and Reliance Capital (Rs 218.25 crore).

Tulsi Extrusions led the volume chart with trades of around 3.62 crore shares followed by Reliance Natural Resources (1.79 crore), Reliance Power (1.77 crore), IRB Infrastructure (1.61 crore) and Centurion Bank of Punjab (1.51 crore).