Sensex ends with moderate gains

MUMBAI, MAY 4.The Bombay sensitive index recovered early losses and even ended with moderate gains in lacklustre activity on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) today on late buying support on hopes of favourable decision on carry-forward mechanism by the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBIi) at its board meeting tomorrow.

The late recovery that helped select stocks rally smartly was prompted by optimism that the SEBI might favourably look into the proposal to ban carry-forward trading in the backdrop of news that the SEBI chairman Mr. D. R. Mehta and the Finance Minister, Mr. Yashwant Sinha, had detailed discussions on the issue in New Delhi this afternoon ahead of its board meeting.

Operators were also forced to cover short positions on speculations that the BSE was in the process to issue notices to all those who are still short in counters, dealers said.

Foreign institutional investors, net investments of which have crossed the magic figure of Rs. 10,000 crores in the first four months of the year, were reportedly net buyers in some blue chip stocks during the last one hour.

Earlier, equities suffered a setback at the initial part of the session as domestic operators and speculators attempted to get rid of whatever long positions they have at the last day of the current settlement.

The BSE sensitive index opened moderately down at 3471.95 and later dipped to the intra-day low of 3465.50 before ending at 3514.59 as against yesterday's close of 3494.48, a net gain of 20.11 points. The BSE-100 index also improved by 17.01 points to 1710.82 from the previous close of 1693.81.

In the specified group, 87 counters including fifteen index-based shares registered gains while 80 others finished with moderate losses.

The BSE-200 index and the Dollex were quoted moderately up at 370.63 and 131.77 compared with the previous close of 367.20 and 130.49 respectively. The BSE-500 index edged up by 9.77 points to 1089.18 from the yesterday's close of 1079.41.

The volume was low at Rs. 1,248.59 crores. Satyam Computer clocked a turnover of Rs. 135.59 crores followed by Himachal Futuristic (Rs. 132.29 crores), Wipro (Rs. 125.67 crores), Infosys Tech (Rs. 106.52 crores) and Global Telesystem (Rs. 79.16 crores).

- PTI

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