Sensex drops 56pts, Yes Bank down 4%

The Sensex opened on a flat note at 7,303, but buying in select counters saw the index touch a high of 7,338 in early trades.

Selling commenced soon after, and dragged the index into negative zone. After exhibiting a negative, range-bound trend thereafter, the Sensex scrips came under the grip of sustained selling pressure towards the fag-end. The index touched an intra-day low of 7,237 - down 101 points from the day's high - before finally closing with a loss of 56 points at 7,248.

The sectoral indices also largely finished with losses today. The BSE Capital Goods Index, however, moved up 0.61% (24 points) to 3,919. The BSE SmallCap and BSE MidCap indices, too, closed with marginal gains.

The broad market, however, finished on a bullish note. Out of 2,551 scrips traded, 1,380 advanced, 1,102 declined and 69 were unchanged today.

Reliance dropped 1.18% (Rs 7) to Rs 631. While ONGC tumbled 1.75% (Rs 16) to Rs 925, ITC declined a per cent (Rs 14) to Rs 1,730. HLL was down 1.23% (Rs 2) at Rs 157.

While Satyam shed 2.25% (Rs 11) to Rs 485, TCS declined 1.18% (Rs 15) to Rs 1,270. Infosys, too, ended lower at Rs 2,203 - down Rs 17. Wipro, however, moved up a per cent (Rs 7) to Rs 709.

HDFC Bank dropped 2% (Rs 13) to Rs 644, and ICICI Bank was down a per cent at Rs 464. SBI, however, scaled up 1.21% (Rs 9) to Rs 726.

Bajaj (down Rs 4 to Rs 1,380), Tata Motors (down Rs 6 to Rs 460) and Maruti (down Rs 7 to Rs 450) lost ground on selling pressure. Hero Honda, however, bucked the downtrend and surged 4.68% (Rs 28) to Rs 636.

Grasim dipped 2% (Rs 22) to Rs 1,070, and Gujarat Ambuja slipped 1.43% to Rs 62. ACC, came off its highs after announing its Q1 numbers, and closed up a rupee at Rs 423.

Ranbaxy slumped 2.82% (Rs 30) to Rs 1,022. Dr. Reddy's and Cipla were down a per cent each at Rs 754 and Rs 323, respectively.

HDFC shed 1.33% (Rs 12) to Rs 889, and Bharti lost 1.80% (Rs 5) to Rs 254. While Tata Power soared 3.12% (Rs 12) to Rs 408, L&T gained a per cent (Rs 13) to Rs 1,262.

HMT zoomed nearly 15% (Rs 7) to Rs 58. VSNL, which had rallied over 18% yesterday, gained 5% (Rs 15) to Rs 345.

SRF, which has been on a bull run, declined over 4% to Rs 279. Gail declined 4% (Rs 8) to Rs 212.

Yes Bank, which had made a solid debut yesterday, dropped 4% to Rs 58.

Zigma Software topped the volume charts with trades in over 1.12 crore shares followed by HFCL (64 lakh shares), SRF (61 lakh shares) and VSNL (60 lakh shares).

VSNL was the most active counter with a turnover of nearly Rs 215 crore followed by SRF (Rs 177 crore) and Reliance Capital (Rs 176 crore).