Restricted deals on BSE

MUMBAI, OCT. 4. Equities closed with moderate gains aiding the Sensex to add about 25 points in restricted activity on the Bombay Stock Exchange today on scattered buying support from speculators and selective purchases by foreign institutional investors.

The market witnessed extremely narrow movements with operators unwilling to enlarge positions in spite of the Prime Minister, Mr. Atal Behari Vajpayee's assurance of partial roll-back of petroproduct price hike, mainly because of worries over rolling settlement which is being introduced shortly.

Majority of broking fraternity was unhappy on the decision to implement the new system of settlement in group `A' scrip having daily badla product and a 5-day badla product as it is considered to be inconvenient for operators.

Citing the decision to introduce rolling settlement as the negative factor, market sources said operators were availing every opportunity to wind up outstanding positions before the new system came into force.

The net sale position of the FIIs who have slowed down their activity considerably in the past several days has also made speculators turn cautious. Meanwhile, foreign funds were reportedly small buyers in select software stocks.

The BSE sensitive index opened moderately down at 4001.63 but later gradually recovered to 4173.65 before closing at 4160.41 against yesterday's close of 4135.55, netting a rise of 24.86 points. The BSE-100 index improved by 13.51 points to 2096.37 from 2082.86.

Cyclicals, particularly Tisco, MTNL, Hindalco and few others found good support. Pharma shares also were in demand. Financial institutions made purchases in small lots in several Indian blue chips, dealers said.

In the specified group, 100 scrips including heavyweights such as Hindustan Lever, ITC and Infosys registered moderate gains while 38 showed losses.

- PTI

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Section  : Business
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