Market continues its record rally

Rising crude oil prices and impending nuclear issue between the UPA government and CPI(M) ruled the investor’s sentiment in the early trades, and the Sensex witnessed a sharp volatility for better part of the session. Negative global cues led the Sensex to open flat, but heavy buying in oil, auto and cement stock propelled the Sensex to the its all-time high of 16,617. The wholesale price index (WPI) rose to 3.32% for the week ended September 8 which was lower than the previous week's increase of 3.52%. The lower WPI also helped the market sentiment to remain positive. The Sensex slipped marginally towards the close and ended the session with a gain of 1.32%, up 216 points at 16,564. The Nifty moved up by 1.90%, up 90 points to close at 4,838.

Surprisingly the breadth of the market was negative. Of the 2,843 stocks traded on the BSE, 1,629 stocks declined, 1,166 stocks advanced and 48 stocks ended unchanged. Among the sectoral indices, the BSE Oil & Gas index flared up by 3.55% followed by the BSE Teck index (up 1.62%), the BSE Realty index (up 1.54%), the BSE PSU index (up 1.28%) and the BSE Auto index (up 1.10%). However, the BSE FMCG index, the BSE HC index and the BSE CD index ended in the negative territory.

Most of the index stocks ended at higher levels. Reliance Industries was the day's star performer and shot up by 3.75% at Rs2,274. Among the other major gainers, Bharti Airtel surged 3.08% at Rs918, SBI vaulted by 2.78% at Rs1,808, Reliance Communication spurted 2.28% at Rs579, Reliance Energy jumped by 2.22% at Rs1,009, Grasim scaled up by 2.20% at Rs3,447, HUL advanced by 2.19% at Rs219, Maruti Udyog added 2.14% at Rs930 and ONGC rose 1.98% at Rs923. Among the laggards ITC slumped by 1.60% at Rs191, Hindalco dropped 1.36% at Rs160, while, Cipla, NTPC, Satyam Computers, Ranbaxy, ACC, HDFC Bank, ICICI Bank and Bajaj Auto slipped marginally.

Oil stocks were in limelight today. Reliance Petro vaulted by 11.60% at Rs155, Gail India soared 3.67% at Rs350, Cairns India added 1.83% at Rs178 and IOC advanced 1.56% at Rs406.

Over 9.52 crore Reliance Natural Resources shares changed hands on the BSE followed by Ambuja Cement (7.05 crore shares), Tata Teleservices (3.50 crore shares), Reliance Petroleum (2.89 crore shares) and IFCI (2.05 crore shares).

Value wise, Ambuja Cement registered a turnover of Rs1,081 crore on the BSE followed by Reliance Natural Resources (Rs673 crore), Reliance Petroleum (Rs437 crore), Reliance Industries (Rs194 crore) and IFCI (Rs170 crore).