Pivotals remain better

MUMBAI, April 30: Pivotals remained better on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) today on speculative support on hopes that the union budget w...

MUMBAI, April 30: Pivotals remained better on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) today on speculative support on hopes that the union budget would be passed smoothly. Resuming better, share prices advanced further during the earlier dealings but turned slightly easy towards the end on profit taking. The closing rates showed small to modest gains. The volume of business remained moderate. The closing undertone remained better.

The BSE sensitive index started better at 3847.03 and improved to 3879.21 before finishing at 3841.11 with a net gain of 32.65 points compared to the previous level of 3808.65. The BSE-100 Index also gained 14.08 points to 1646.05 from the previous level of 1631.97.

Brokers said that fresh recovery was mainly on short covering on optimistic reports that the budget would be passed smoothly. But pivotals declined at the end mainly on lack of specualtive support at the higher mainly due to end-account considerations and tomorrow being a holiday. The decision by the Tamil Maanila Congress (TNC) to join the Gujral-government fuelled hectic speculative buying in kerb dealings last evening. The buoyancy continued in the initial stages of the session as brokers were convinced P Chidambaram would get the finance portfolio which would help passage of the finance bill.

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However, operators resorted to selling pressure partially affected by political development whereby the CBI had decided to prosecute Laloo Prasad Yadav in the animal husbandary case. The profit taking was also due lack of institutional support. The trading period of the session was extended to 4 pm following a technical problem at the start.

The volume of business amounted to Rs 591.56 crore. SBI attracted highest volume of Rs 203.79 crore, followed by Reliance of Rs 140.89 crore, ITC of Rs 63.36 crore, Tisco of Rs 35.64 crore and ACC of Rs 15.09 crore. SBI firmed up from Rs 313 to Rs 324 but profit taking declined from Rs 318.25 with a net gain of Rs 5.25. Reliance also declined from the sessions’ best level of Rs 312.50 to Rs 308 on selling pressure. ITC, Tata Steel, Bajaj Auto, Hindusan Lever, ACC, Mahindra and Mahindra and Hindalco also remained better. Tisco by 1.50 to 182.50 and ACC by 8.75 to 1475.75.

On the National Stock Exchange (NSE), pivotals witnessed brisk activity on the first day of the current settlement. Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) re-entered the market following a patch-up of the TMC with the UF government, which would pave way for smooth passage of the budget. However, prices trimmed the gains on profit-taking and closed with moderate advances. The NSE-50 index opened higher at 1081.10 and and improved further to a high of 1088.40 but trimmed the gains to close at 1079.85, showing a rise of 22.40 points compared to yesterday’s close of 1057.45. The Midcap gained by 18.31 points to close at 1104.65 from 1086.34 prieviously. The total turnover was Rs 1343.43 crore.