Mumbai, March 16: The present political uncertainty gripped the stock exchanges at a time when the bourses were making an attempt to come out of a bearish phase. After a good start, the stock market made a dramatic turnaround, closing sharply lower on Friday, the last day of settlement at the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), in the wake of selling triggered by operators ahead of the week-end.The only good thing that happened to the market was consistent buying from foreign institutional investors (FIIs). The market reacted sharply to fears of political instability after the Telugu Desam Party (TDP) also demanded a thorough probe into the defence deals which was exposed by Tehelka.com. This prompted the operators, to stay away and not to risk ahead of week-end holidays.
After opening weak at 3752.36, the Sensex rallied smartly to the day's high of 3867.47, raising hopes of further recovery in share prices. However, it met with a strong resistance and dropped to an intra-day low of 3696.52 before closing at 3745.74, against Thursday's close of 3819.86, a net fall of 74.12 points (down by 1.94 per cent). The S&P CNX Nifty was down by 23.60 points to close at 1193.55.
Dealers said, FIIs were persistent net buyers in the new economy stocks from technology, media and telecom (TMT) sectors besides select old economy counters like MTNL, ACC and some others. Domestic financial institutions also extended support by making selective purchases in small lots. However, the volume of business showed a noticeable improvement having increased to Rs 1,985 crore on Friday against Thursday's turnover of Rs 1,712 crore.
HFCL eased by 3 per cent at Rs 213.55. While, Satyam computers dropped by 4.5 per cent to Rs 237.45, Infosys by more than 4 per cent to Rs 4,694.20 and RIL by 4.13 per cent to Rs 384.40.
However, Zee Telefilms rose marginally to Rs 143.55, ACC by 4.75 per cent to Rs 172.90 and HPCL by 2.15 per cent to Rs 166.35.
Copyright © 2001 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.
