IT counters led by Satyam Computers, Digital Equipment and Fujitsu ICIM (which hit the upper circuit on BSE) where in big demand, even as mixed quarterly results from the cyclical and commodity stocks turned investors bearish on the sector.

"The cyclicals had moved up a lot on expectation of good results in advance. They have started to retreat now and will continue to do so for sometime'', said Amisha Vora, VP Network Investment and Finance. The BSE-30 index opened marginally up at 4,686.70 fell sharply to a low of 4,592.67 before closing at 4,625.40 as against last friday's close of 4,672.12, netting a fall of 46.72 points or one per cent. The S&P CNX Nifty also lost 16.80 points to close at 1,326.15 compared to itsprevious close of 1342.95.

Movements in pivotal stocks continue to stay narrow in absence of fresh institutional interest. HLL counter was weak due to profit booking as the company announced Q2 results more or less in line with the expectations.

For the Q2 ended Jun 30, '99, the giant reported a net profit of Rs 226.7 crore on a sales of Rs 2752.78 crore against a net profit of Rs 181.61 crore on a sales of Rs 2484.53 crore in the corresponding period previous year. Grasim at Rs 309.15 hit the lower limit of the circuit breaker on profit- booking. Majority of cyclical stocks weakened further as profit-booking at the higher levels continued. FIs and domestic mutual funds sold key scrips like Grasim, Indian Rayon, Voltas, Bhel, Telco, Tisco, SBI among others.

Chetan Shah at Shailesh Merchant and Brokers said: "The IT sector has clearly out-performed the rest with continued growth. While leading counters like Infosys, Sataym Computer and Pentafour Software were steady, Digital Equipment at Rs 612.35,Tata Elxsi at Rs 82.30, Aftek Infosys at Rs 107.85, Mastek at Rs 1245, KLG Systel at Rs 198 and Fujitsu ICIM at Rs 360.85 hit the upper limits of circuit breaker on the BSE''. "The weakness is primarily due to the high badla rates of 22-24 per cent previous Saturday and tomorrow being the last day of the current settlement on NSE added to squaring up activity'', said Alok Churiwala, a BSE broker. Auto ancillary shares continued to firm up following the apparent recovery in the automobile sector. Ucal Fuel at Rs 77.15, MICO at Rs 5598.85, Sundaram Fasteners at Rs 540.25 and Motherson Sumi at Rs 98.50 hit the upper limits of circuit breaker.

Market continued hammering stocks which did not live up to expectations like Crompton Greaves (Rs 52.50), Indian Rayon (Rs 65.85), Grasim (Rs 309.15), Philips India (Rs 147.20) hit the lower limits of the circuit breaker following disappointing performances for the quarter ended 9906. ``Cyclicals which appreciated substantially in the last two months are correctingdownwards due to profit-booking with the focus again shifting to growth stocks. The market will take a while before it goes up again. All corrections should be used to enter the market'', said Malay Sameer at Apple Financial Securities.