MUMBAI, August 11: Pivotals recovered smartly on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) on emergence of speculative support coupled with widespread buying by foreign institutional investors (FIIs). The Sensex spurted by 84 points as the new account commenced on a better note and scrips led by Reliance and others rallied further as the session progressed.

The BSE senstive index started better at 4434.02 and touched the day's high of 4482.51 points. However, dipped to a day's low of 4423.69 and finally settled at 4481.30, with a handsome gain of 83.76 over the previous close of 4397.54. The BSE-100 rose by 33.56 to 1947.58 points from 1914.02.

Apart from today being the first session for the current settlement, the sentiment was also boosted following heavy buying support by FIIs. They bought shares in Madras Refineries, Sterlite, Reliance, SBI, Tata Steel, BHEL, Reckitt, Ranbaxy, Bajaj Auto, Hero Honda, Hindulco and others. The fresh speculative buying was also due to below normal badla.

``The re-entry of the foreign funds, seeking to increase their weightage in the Indian market helped the market to stage an excellent rally. The bull phase was also aided by increased participation of retail investors,'' said a broker.

The total turnover recovered to Rs 1000.40 crore. Reliance was in the lead with the turnover of Rs 315.19 crore, followed by ITC Rs 165.88 crore, SBI Rs 162.46 crore and Tata Tea Rs 57.00 crore.

On NSE, pivotals improved marginally despite lacklustre trading. The NSE-50 index closed at 1258.35, showing a net gain of 1.40 points. The Midcap index closed at 1359.10 (1360.10 points). The total turnover on the NSE was Rs 1609.57 crore.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.