Sensex drops 75pts, HMT zooms 15%

The Sensex opened with a positive gap of 16 points at 8,816, and moved up to a high of 8,822 in early deals. The index started drifting lower on profit-taking, and dropped to a low of 8,696 - a drop of 126 points from the intra-day high - in noon deals. The Sensex finally closed with a loss of 75 points (0.86%) at 8,724.

All the sectoral indices, too, declined today. The BSE FMCG Index dropped 2.6% (40 points) to 1,516. The BSE Bankex was down 2.3% (120 points) to 5,043. The BSE Metal Index was down 1.7% (118 points) at 6,923. The BSE SmallCap Index was down 1% (56 points) at 5,856.

Declines were ahead of advances - out of 2,583 scrips traded, 1,652 declined, 893 advanced and 38 were unchanged today.

ITC dropped nearly 4% (Rs 5) to Rs 131. While ONGC declined Rs 8 to Rs 1,072, Reliance was down Rs 4 at Rs 802.

SBI dipped Rs 10 to Rs 947, and HLL was down Rs 3 at Rs 181.

Infosys, which was weak right through the session, finally closed with a gain of Rs 13 at Rs 2,643. Wipro added Rs 4 to Rs 404. TCS declined Rs 20 to Rs 1,470.

ICICI Bank slipped 4.8% (Rs 28) to Rs 561. BHEL dropped Rs 19 to Rs 1,260. Bajaj was down Rs 15 at Rs 1,795.

Ranbaxy moved up over 2% (Rs 10) to Rs 513. Grasim added Rs 13 to Rs 1,353. HDFC was up Rs 8 at Rs 1,031.

HMT zoomed 15% (Rs 14) to Rs 105. Zee gained 7% (Rs 12) to Rs 188. SKF moved up 7% (Rs 16) to Rs 247.

Reliance was the most active counter with a turnover of Rs 141 crore followed by Infosys (Rs 105 crore), ITC (Rs 93 crore), Satyam (Rs 81 crore) and SBI (Rs 81 crore).