A new high, but a flat close

The Sensex began the year on a bouyant note by opening with a positive gap of 24 points at 9422. The index soon scaled to touch a new intra-day lifetime peak of 9457.

However, the index paused there, and began to exhibit range-bound movement. Thereafter, some selling pressure in select auto, technology and FCMG stocks saw the index shed all its gains and slip into the negative zone to touch a low of 9366 - down 91 points from its peak.

The Sensex finally closed the first trading day of 2006 with marginal losses of eight points at 9390.

ICICI Bank up 2.1% (Rs 12) at Rs 597 was the major gainer among the Sensex stocks. Hindalco at Rs 146, HDFC Bank at Rs 713, Maruti at Rs 645 and Ranbaxy at Rs 365 also finished with gains.

Reliance Industries touched a new lifetime high of Rs902, before settling 1% gain at Rs 899. Reliance Energy was up 1.2% at Rs 612.

ONGC gained 1.5% at Rs 1,193.

Tata Motors led the losers list, with losses of 2% at Rs 639. Bharti Tele shed 1.8% at Rs 340 followed by Dr.Reddy's at Rs 963 and Hero Honda at Rs 846, down 1.6% each.

HLL at Rs 195, ITC at Rs 141, Grasim at Rs 1,376 and NTPC at Rs 111, declined 1% each.

Infosys at Rs 2,979, Satyam at Rs 731, TCS at Rs 1,690 and Wipro at Rs 461 declined less than 1% each.