Sensex ends up 80pts; MindTree zooms 13%

After opening marginally (21 points) higher at 12,925, the Sensex rallied a high of 13,027 - up 124 points - in the morning trades. While cement stocks witnessed renewed buying interest, metal and technology stocks supported the rally today.

The index, however, could not hold gains as weakness in select heavyweights like HLL, Bharti and Infosys saw it slip to a low of 12,818 - down 209 points from the day's high.

Fresh buying at lower levels, mainly in metal and technology stocks, saw the index finally close with a gain of 80 points at 12,983.

While the Mid-cap index rallied 1.5% to 5354, the Small-cap index soared nearly 2% to 6435.

The BSE Auto, Bankex, Metal and Oil & Gas indices advanced 1% each to 4748, 6539, 8228 and 6213, respectively.

The market breadth was positive - out of 2,675 stocks traded, 1,739 advanced, 851 declined and 85 were unchanged today.

INDEX MOVERS & SHAKERS

Satyam, TCS, Grasim and Tata Steel surged around 2% each to Rs 452, Rs 1,264, Rs 2,054 and Rs 445, respectively.

Cipla and ONGC gained 1.8% each at Rs 237 and Rs 807, respectively.

Wipro, NTPC and HDFC advanced 1.5% each to Rs 582, Rs 142 and Rs 1,607, respectively.

Larsen & Toubro and Tata Motors were up over 1% each at Rs 1,530 and Rs 773, respectively.

HLL shed 2% to Rs 181. Reliance Energy slipped 1.7% to Rs 466, and Ranbaxy declined 1% to Rs 321.

MOST ACTIVE COUNTERS

MindTree Consulting, which zoomed 12.7% to Rs 879,  topped the value chart with a turnover of Rs 687 crore followed by Tech Mahindra (Rs 186 crore), Idea Cellular (Rs 150 crore), Global Broadcast (Rs 105 crore) and ACC (Rs 100 crore).

Idea Cellular led the volume chart with trades of around 1.68 crore shares followed by IFCI (1.35 crore), MindTree Consulting (78 lakh), Firstsource (61 lakh) and India Cements (41.65 lakh).