Lift from crude fall

STOCKS REPORT

The market extended gains on Tuesday as buying continued in blue chip and oil sector stocks on the back of easing international crude oil prices and strong quarterly results.

The benchmark Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) Sensex ended 50.66 points higher to close at 5,754.76. The Nifty ended 15.95 points higher to close at 1,813.70.

Technology stocks, however, remained subdued ahead of the US elections on Tuesday.

Among the indices, the BSE FMGC index was the biggest gainer, up 2.52 per cent at 924.87. The BSE Oil and Gas index was up 1.71 per cent to close at 2,974.68, while the BSE IT index was down 0.94 per cent at 2,371.35 on profit booking in frontline stocks.

Volumes on the bourses were low, with shares worth Rs 1,227 crore being traded on th BSE. The breadth of the market was positive with 1,507 gainers and 663 losers.

Oil stocks were back in the limelight as global crude oil prices dipped under $50 a barrel on Monday for the first time in a month and were more than $5 off the record high of $55.67 hit last week.

Index heavyweight and private sector refiner Reliance Industries rose 2.5 per cent to Rs 542.85, while Indian Oil Corporation rose 2.4 per cent to Rs 439.45.

"A sharp drop in oil prices and strong foreign institutional investors inflows have resulted in the market bouncing back in the last two days. The rally is driven by access liquidity in the system and on expectation of a strong performance by corporates," said a senior vice-president at a domestic broking firm.

Foreign funds bought about $876 million worth of Indian shares in October, and nearly half of that was in the last two sessions, towards the $1.17 billion initial public offering of the National Thermal Power Corporation. (NTPC), which will be listed on Friday.

On November, the FIIs bought Indian equities worth Rs 131.9 crore, while, mutual funds were net buyers to the tune of Rs 28.4 crore.

Software stocks, however, remained subdued on a weaker rupee and ahead of the US election, with Tata Consultancy Services falling nearly one per cent to Rs 1,158.65 and Infosys Technologies ending 1.9 per cent to Rs 1,910.05.

Others like Wipro was up 0.86 per cent to Rs 660.10 and Satyam Computer up 0.34 per cent to Rs 373.70 ended with modest gains after volatile intra-day movements.

Among heavyweights ITC was up 3.60 per cent to Rs 1,125, Hindustan Lever up 2.03 per cent to Rs 128 and Tata Power up 3.52 per cent to Rs 316.30.

Bajaj Auto was up 2.26 per cent to Rs 983.30 on fresh buying after Monday's fall from higher levels. The company on Monday said that its motorcycle sales in October 2004 rose 34 per cent to 1,43,491 units, compared with 1,07,115 units in October 2003.

Its two- and three-wheeler sales rose 13.4 per cent to 1,76,693 from 155,783 in October 2003. Cement stocks witnessed renewed buying interest on strong October despatch numbers. Gujarat Ambuja Cements was up 2.39 per cent to Rs 352.80, while ACC was up 1.53 per cent to Rs 262.90 on strong October sales.