Mumbai, Jan 14: The markets showed mixed trends on Friday and closedmarginally higher, ending a week marked by extreme volatility. Fromdisappointing results to restructuring to global merger talks, the marketswitnessed some amount of volatility on Friday. At the end of the day'strading, the BSE Sensex closed 26.35 points up at 5471.27, while the Niftyon the NSE closed 1.35 points up at 1622.75.The recently-reduced exposure limits took its toll in the market on Friday,as a large number of brokers resorting to compulsory selling in the morningsession to adhere to the stipulated levels. However, the resumption ofmerger talks between Glaxo and Smithkline Beecham gave the markets somethingto cheer about. Also, talks of a probable restructuring in the engineeringmajor L&T infused some steam into the counter. Earlier during the day, thescrip was hammered badly on disappointing third quarter results.
There was substantial volatility in the index-based counters like Infosysand L&T. Infosys was down by more than six per cent during the first half.By the end of the day, however, it showed a gain of one per cent, showing arally of around eight per cent from the day's low. L&T was more volatile. It hit the lower circuit in the afternoon, but by the end of the day, wasup by 2 per cent from previous day's close. During the last half-an-hour,MTNL too hit the circuit and provided major help to the Sensex. Among theother heavyweights in the index, HLL and SBI showed a drop in their prices,but ITC and Ranbaxy showed a positive close.
The Sensex opened at 5460.31 points, hit a high of 5476.38 points beforeclosing at 5471.27 points. The low for the day was 5344.59 points. Thenumber of advances was 832 whereas the number of declines was 1345. Around233 stocks remained unchanged. The trading volume for the day was Rs 3439crore.
Among the software stocks, a lower circuit in the Silverline counteraffected the sentiment. However, by the end of the day, except Rolta, GlobalTele and Silverline, other stocks like Pentafour and Digital showed a firmclose. Among the top software stocks, Satyam Computer was the strongest andshowed an impressive gain. SSI hit the upper circuit, and remained there fora major part of the day.
In the specified list, stocks like IPCL, ICICI, Wockhardt, Escorts, Glaxo,Ashok Leyland, Sun Pharma, Ceat, Vikas WSP, Exide and Indian Rayon showedimpressive gains.
In the non-specified list, stocks like Kerala Ayurvedic, Vision Tech, BlueStar, Hinditron, BSEL, Centum Electronics, Nath Seeds, Krebs Bio, Cox &Kings, Videocon VCR and Wordwide Tele remained the star performers.
Copyright © 1999 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.