Mumbai, April 22: After a firm start, share prices met with heavy selling pressure from foreign funds and declined sharply on the first day of the current settlement at the National Stock Exchange (NSE) on Wednesday. The market witnessed a total turnover of Rs 1,856.87 crore from 891.13 lakhs shares in a record number of trades at 2,92,616. Debentures turnover was Rs 9.73 lakh.The NSE-50 index opened better at 1212.95 and rose to 1247.15. It later declined to close at 1210.80, showing a small fall of 1.95 over the last close of 1212.75. The Dollar NSE-50 (Defty) index started weak at 1057.60 and closed at 1056.50, revealing a loss of 2.25 from the last level of 1058.75. The midcap index resumed better at 1699.30, but fell to finish at 1697.00, disclosing a fall of 1.85 over the last close of 1698.85.
About 611 shares were on the plus side, while 564 declined and 80 held steady with 243 securities hitting their price bands at the exchange on Wednesday.
The most actively traded securities today were ITC(Rs 272.86 crore), Reliance (Rs 234.82 crore), SBI (Rs 107.16 crore) and ACC (Rs 104.51 crore). Other actively traded securities were Tata Tea (Rs 80.28 crore), Glaxo (Rs 60.40 crore), Castrol (Rs 49.17 crore), LML (Rs 43.70 crore), TISCO (Rs 35.73 crore), TELCO (Rs 35.58 crore), HLL (Rs 34.93 crore), ICICI (Rs 34.77 crore), Infosys Technology (Rs 34.70 crore), Bajaj Auto (Rs 34.31 crore), Pentafour Software (Rs 32.54 crore), Digital Equipment (Rs 31.18 crore), BHEL (Rs 19.67 crore), Sterlite (Rs 19.58 crore), BSESs (Rs 18.21 crore), MTNL (Rs 17.90 crore) Dr Reddy's (Rs 17.33 crore), L&T (Rs 16.12 crore), Nestle (Rs 15.12 crore) and Apollo Tyres (Rs 14.96 crore).
The top five Nifty gainers were Nestle Rs 464.85 (Rs 438.90), Grasim Rs 361.60 (Rs 342.35), HDFC Bank Rs 81.70 (Rs 78.25), Gujarat Ambuja Cement Rs 305.05 (Rs 294.95) and Bajaj Auto Rs 637.05 (Rs 617.30).
The main losers were ABB Rs 639.50 (Rs 672.15), Glaxo Rs 429.15 (Rs 451.05), Asian Paints Rs 340.60 (Rs 355.40) and Indian Rayon Rs 231.55 (Rs237.95).Meanwhile, on BSE speculatives lost initial gains and even suffered a sharp setback bringing the Sensex down by over 101 points on Wednesday as operators as well as financial institutions turned heavy sellers after midsession. Sensing the absence of foreign institutional investors, the main market moving factor, bulls availed the opportunity to off-load outstanding positions as local institutions, led by unit trust of India, were seen selling heavily in a bid to book profits in high priced scrips, particularly pharma and software shares.
Copyright © 1998 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
