Bargain buying fails to cheer

STOCKS REPORT

The markets ended flat after a volatile trading session, though the blue-chip stocks witnessed bargain hunting at the fag end.

The Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) Sensex recovered from the day's low of 5056.07 to close at 5102.37, still 0.55 points lower to the Friday's close. The NSE Nifty ended 0.95 points higher at 1599.15.

The volumes on the BSE, however, were lower at Rs 1,450 crore compared with the average volume of around Rs 2,000 crore.

The biggest gainer among the index stocks was the Tata Steel after the company announced the acquisition of NatSteel of Singapore. The stock was up 4.07 per cent to Rs 266.15. The counter witnessed impressive volumes of more than 66.7 lakh shares on the BSE.

SAIL was up 5.25 per cent and closed at Rs 40.25 after touching the day's low of Rs 37.45. Over 2.10 crore SAIL shares were traded on BSE.

Most of the index heavyweights recovered from their day's low but still ended in the negative territory on concerns over rising international oil prices and fledgling inflation.

While the international oil prices rose to a record high of $46.85 per barrel in early trading hours on Monday, government data released on Friday indicated that domestic inflation surged to 7.61 per cent on July 31, 2004 compared with 7.52 per cent in the previous week.

HLL was the biggest loser in the BSE basket closing down 3.85 per cent at Rs 106.65. The stock touched a 7-year low of Rs 105.40 in the intra-day trading on sustained selling pressure after the recent downgrading by leading brokerages. More than 10.2 lakh HLL shares changed hands on BSE.