Sensex ends off lows as realty, power recover

2 Dec 2008, 1546 hrs IST

Benchmarks staged sharp recovery in the afternoon but still ended in the red after traders covered short positions in realty, power and banking space.

Bombay Stock Exchange’s Sensex ended at 8716.42, down 123.45 points or 1.40 per cent. The index touched an intra-day high of 8745.23 and a low of 8467.43.

National Stock Exchange’s Nifty closed at 2662, down 0.78 per cent or 20.90 points. The 50-share index hit an intra-day high of 2672.90 and a low of 2570.70.

BSE Midcap Index was down 1.67 per cent and BSE Smallcap Index fell 1.54 per cent.

Amongst the sectoral indices, BSE FMCG Index closed 0.80 per cent, BSE Realty Index was up 0.41 per cent, BSE Power Index ended 0.13 per cent up.

BSE Auto Index ended 2.81 per cent lower, BSE IT Index slipped 2.51 per cent and BSE Oil&gas Index fell 2.51 per cent.

Gains in Reliance Infrastructure (5.6%), Bharti Airtel (3.2%), Jaiprakash Associates (2.93%), NTPC (2.66%), DLF (2.24%) and ITC (2.24%) helped indices close off lows.

Mahindra & Mahindra (-8.1%), Maruti Suzuki (-5.26%), Tata Consultancy Services (-4.9%), Larsen & Toubro (-3.28%) and Tata Steel (-3.16%) ended with significant losses.

Market breadth on BSE remained weak with 1283 declines outnumbering 796 advances.

(All the figures are provisional)

via:E.T