The Hindu : Business : Sensex gains another 129 points

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Thursday, May 20, 2004

Business

Business

Sensex gains another 129 points

MUMBAI, MAY 19. Extending the rally to second day in a row, the BSE Sensex today jumped by another 129 points at close in high volatility even as the prevailing political situation continued to influence the capital market that cheered reports of Congress leader Manmohan Singh emerging as the Prime Ministerial candidate.

The BSE benchmark 30-share index opened with a wide gap at 4941.72 and later rallied sharply beyond the 5000-mark to the intra-day high of 5059.89 before ending at 5006.10 against yesterday's close of 4877.02, a net rise of 129.08 points or 2.65 per cent.

Crediting early market upswing to strong possibility of Dr. Singh, the former Finance Minister who is known as the architect of economic reforms, taking over as Prime Minister following the Congress President, Sonia Gandhi, declining to take the top post, brokers said the market danced to the tune of political drama that unfolded during the session.

At times, it met with resistance as those operators who did not get an opportunity to unload their positions during the last two sessions, booked profits at higher levels in the light of political uncertainty, brokers added.

The market stabilised after the midsession when Ms. Gandhi began meeting the allies for fresh letters of support making it almost clear that Dr. Singh was to be nominated for the top post with the Congress Parliamentary Party (CPP) convening a meeting this evening to elect a new leader.

The most battered sectors such as PSU and banking hogged the limelight and scored impressive gains on heavy purchases by local mutual funds led by Indian financial institutions which reported net purchases of Rs. 342 crores on Monday, the day of historic carnage. As a result, the BSE-PSU index flared up further by 274.35 points or 9.21 per cent to close at 3253.36 and the Bankex zoomed by another 131.10 points or 5.12 per cent to 2692.18.

Though gains in heavyweighted counters were trimmed sizably because of profit taking by operators, RIL, SBI, Tata Motors, Tisco, ONGC, HPCL, Infosys Technologies, MUL (which is included in the Sensex family in place of L&T with effect from May 19), Hindalco, BHEL, HLL and Satyam Computer recorded sharp gains on hectic buying support.

However, select blue chip stocks such as Bajaj Auto, Grasim, ITC, Wipro, Ranbaxy, HDFC, and Dr. Reddy's showed marked to moderate losses on selling pressure.

PTI

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