<b>Infosys Impact:</b>Sensex zooms 270pts

The Sensex opened with a positive gap of 49 points at 13,163 on the back of strong Infosys numbers and projections. Despite weakness in other Asian markets, the index surged to higher levels backed by aggressive buying in technology stocks.

More good news came in from the inflation front, which dropped below the 6%-mark to 5.74%. Stocks from the auto, banking and metal sector joined the party, which saw the index rally to a high of 13,421. The Sensex finally ended with a solid gain of 270 points (2%) at 13,384.  In the process, the index logged gains f 4% (528 points) this week.

The BSE IT index zoomed 4% to 5072. The Auto index rallied 3% to 4818. The Bankex advanced 2.6% to 6640, and the Metal index surged 2% to 9304.

The market breadth was positive - out of 2,634 stocks traded so far, 1,560 advanced, 988 declined and 86 were unchanged today.

TECHNO PARTY: INFOSYS SETS THE BALL ROLLING

Satyam zoomed 8% to Rs 482. TCS and Wipro surged 5% each to Rs 1,263 and Rs 568, respectively. Infosys rallied over 2% to Rs 2,088.

Bajaj Auto soared 4% to Rs 2,444. SBI, Hero Honda, Tata Steel, Reliance Communications, ACC and Larsen & Toubro advanced around 3% each to Rs 999, Rs 648, Rs 511, Rs 421, Rs 748 and Rs 1,612, respectively.

ICICI Bank moved up 2.7% to Rs 873. ONGC, Tata Motors and HDFC Bank were up over 2% each at Rs 872, Rs 726 and Rs 979, respectively.

Maruti, Reliance, HDFC, Bharti Airtel and Gujarat Ambuja gained around 1.5% each at Rs 772, Rs 1,411, Rs 1,561, Rs 781 and Rs 109, respectively.

ITC dropped nearly 2% to Rs 153, and NTPC shed 1.5% to Rs 157.

INCREDIBLE ICRA

ICRA debuted on the BSE at Rs 525 - a premium of 59% against its issue price of Rs 330. Frenzied buying at the counter saw the stock zoom to a high of Rs 880.

The stock finally ended with an incredible gain of Rs 468 (142%) on Day 1 at Rs 798.

MOST ACTIVE COUNTERS

Debutant ICRA topped the value chart with a turnover of Rs 875.20 crore followed by Infosys (Rs 284 crore), Tata Steel (Rs 139.65 crore), Satyam (Rs 103.35 crore) and Tech Mahindra (Rs 83 crore).

IFCI led the volume chart with trades of around 1.80 crore shares followed by ICRA (1.25 crore), Petronet LNG (55.30 lakh), Idea (48.40 lakh) and Reliance Natural Resources (44.80 lakh).