Although market was rife with rumours that FII and domestic institutions like LIC and SBI Mutual fund placed buy orders at the counters of Sierra Optima, Britannia, Smithkline Beecham, Bausch & Lomb, Tata Power, Bhel, Ranbaxy, BSES and SBI, it was learnt that FIIs remained aggressive sellers at the counters of PSU's like BPCL, HPCL, MTNL and VSNL. Sentiments were further dampened by rumours that the IRA bill would not be taken up at the forthcoming winter session of the Parliament.

``Index is moving in a small trading zone. Political stability is what the market is looking forward,'' explained S Subramanium of Warburg Dillon Read, an FII brokerage outfit.

FIIs once again turned net sellers on the local bourses. While on the BSE they were net sellers to the tuneof Rs 16 crore, on the NSE, where apparently it was the last day of the trading cycle, the FIIs were net sellers to the tune of only Rs 7.25 crore. However, domestic institutions were net buyers to the tune of Rs 3.75 crore.

``We have reached the crucial bottom levels of 1996. The index is now hovering around the five year bottom of 2,713 points registered in 1996,'' said Ajit Sanghvi, BSE broker, expressing fears on the thin support level which would be difficult to survive considering the institutional sales at every level.

Interestingly, Bausch & Lomb moved with a price band over Rs 10. Market was agog with rumours that a US-based FII was seen accumulating the stock at Rs 75-levels. The stock moved in range of Rs 71-84.15 and closed the day at Rs 84.15 (which is also the day's high), where a circuit filter had to be slapped to curb any further price rise. The counter also clocked a phenomenal volume of over 7.64 lakh shares on the NSE.

In a lacklustre market, select purchases by institutionalparticipants coupled with short covering saw stocks like CESC, Kelvinator, Silverline, Mastek and Rhone Poulenc register handsome recovery. Another interesting feature of the day was the increasing number of cross deals at the counters of certain illiquid B2 group stocks, which are quoting below par value. New Bombay Printing registered a cross deal of 1 lakh shares traded at Rs 0.10, and Indo Rama Synthetics about 5 lakh shares at Rs 6.25. Among the pivotals, Reliance, Ashok Leyland, HPCL, Punjab Tractors, Pentafour and Hero Honda witnessed cross deals in the range of 10,000 to 55,000 on an average, few of which were reported in the demat segment of the BSE.

FIIs pulled out $10m last week

Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) have pulled out $10.2 million from the Indian bourses during the week ended November 27, thanks to their heavy offloading in the debt segment of the market. In rupee terms, this translates into a net outflow of Rs 43.2 crore.

According to the latest FII investment figuresreleased by the Securities and Exchange Board of India (Sebi), while the FIIs brought in $ 3.4 million in the equity segment of the market, they have taken out $ 13.6 million from the debt segment. The FIIs, for the eighth week in succession, did not make any purchases in the debt segment. According to the Sebi figures, during the week ended November 27, in the equity segment, gross purchases by the FIIs were for Rs 228.6 crore, while gross sales were for Rs 214.3 crore. This gives a net sales figure of Rs 14.3 crore ($ 3.4 million) in the segment. During the current month till November 27, the FIIs have already pulled out $ 42.3 million (Rs 178.9 crore) from the Indian bourses with a $ 60.2 million (Rs 254.6 crore) outflow from the debt segment being the main culprit. However, the heavy investment outflow from the debt segment has somewhat been offset by the $ 17.8 million (Rs 75.6 crore) net inflow in the equity segment during the period under consideration.