Sensex hits new high of 10,238; NTPC zooms 5%

The Sensex opened marginally (11 points) higher at 10,179. The index slipped to 10,157 before bouncing to higher levels. The index rallied to a new, all-time intra-day high of 10,238. The Sensex finally finished with a gain of 56 points at 10,224.

The BSE PSU and Metal indices gained 1.5% and 1.7% to 5645 and 7097, respectively. While the Smallcap Index dropped 0.8% to 6147, the Midcap Index was marginally down at 4746.

The market breadth was bearish - out of 2,573 stocks traded, 1,688 declined, 817 advanced and 68 were unmoved today.

Heavy buying towards the close saw NTPC soar to a new, all-time high of Rs 131 before settling with a smart gain of 5.4% at Rs 129. The counter clocked a volume of around 19.39 lakh shares.

While Cipla and Ranbaxy surged 3% each to Rs 559 and Rs 463, respectively, Dr.Reddy's declined 2.3% to Rs 1,358.

HDFC advanced 3.5% to Rs 1,376. BHEL surged 2.4% to Rs 1,916. Tata Power and Tata Steel gained over 2% each to Rs 508 and Rs 411, respectively.

HLL moved up 1.8% to Rs 241. Grasim (Rs 1,677), Hindalco (Rs 156), Reliance Energy (Rs 607) and ONGC (Rs 1,174) gained over 1% each.

Larsen & Toubro (Rs 2,305), Bajaj Auto (Rs 2,544) and Gujarat Ambuja (Rs 86) declined over 1% each today.

Debutant Jagran Prakashan began trading on a positive note at Rs 376 - a 17.5% premium to the issue price of Rs 320. The stock soon scaled a high of Rs 405. It, however, could not hold the gains and came tumbling to a low of Rs 268 - a 34% (Rs 137) fall in intra-day deals. The stock finally ended Day 1 at Rs 274 - a discount of 14.4% (Rs 46) to the issue price.

Rain Calcining zoomed over 16% to Rs 46.80. Coromandel Fertilisers, Moving Pictures, Ansal Infrastructure, Mysore Cement, Aban Loyd, Shree Cement, National Fertilisers, Hindustan Zinc, GE Shipping, Raymond, Crompton Greaves, Gujarat Gas and National Aluminium ended with sharp gains today.

Sree Sakhti plunged nearly 10% to Rs 21.85. Royal Orchid, Goodricke, Jagatji Industries Harrison Malyalam, Williamson Tea, McLeod Russel, Micro Inks, iGate Global, FACT, FDC and Dena Bank declined 4-8% each.

Debutant Jagran Prakashan topped the value chart with a turnover of Rs 375.45 crore followed by Reliance Capital (Rs 106.24 crore), Larsen & Toubro (Rs 102.59 crore), Reliance (Rs 91.91 crore) and Satyam (Rs 68.03 crore).

Jagran also led the volume chart with trades of around 1.29 crore shares followed by Reliance Capital Ventures (79.70 lakh), Prism (54.80 lakh), Mysore Cement (44.80 lakh) and HFCL (37 lakh).