Markets end higher on expiry day; auto, metal, telecom up

26 February 2009

The benchmark indices witnessed some buying interest in late trade and managed to end higher on the settlement day. Shares of auto, metal, telecom and upstream oil companies have supported the markets. However, sell-off in ICICI Bank, SBI, Ranbaxy, HDFC, Tata Power, Wipro and Hindalco capped the upside in the benchmark indices. Global cues and announcement of inflation were non-events of the day.

It had started the day on a weak note and remained in negative terrain till 1:30 pm. But then after, buying support from heavyweights had helped the markets to recover a bit from day's low despite extreme volatility in last two hours of trade.

The 30-share BSE Sensex swung nearly 210 points between an intraday high of 8,998.31 and low of 8,788.32, before closing the day at 8,954.86, up 0.595 or 52.30 points. The 50-share NSE Nifty was up 0.84% or 23.15 points, to settle at 2,785.65, after swinging roughly 66 points between a day's high/low of 2797.80 and 2731.90, respectively.

Among frontliners, ONGC, Reliance Industries, NTPC, Bharti, BHEL, Infosys, Reliance Communication, Maruti, Grasim, HDFC Bank, Sterlite, SAIL and Tata Motors were being supportive.

Auto players outperformed for the second day in a row, respective index jumped 71.92 points or 2.74%, to close at 2,694.30. Tata Motors and Amtek Auto shot up over 7% each. Maruti Suzuki, Ashok Leyland, Bharat Forge and Hero Honda gained 3-5%. M&M was up 0.74%.

Shares of upstream oil companies have supported the Oil & Gas index to close with a gain of 78.03 points or 1.28% at 6,165.33. ONGC, GAIL, Reliance Industries and Cairn India went up 1-2.7%. However, oil marketing companies like BPCL, HPCL and IOC tumbled 2.7-4%.