Sensex ends down 228pts; RCom zooms 10%

The main index of the Bombay Stock Exchange, the Sensex, opened with a hefty negative gap of 524 points at 10,285 on the back of weak cues from global markets as fears of a major recession loomed large.

Aggressive selling in index heavyweights saw the index tumble to a low of 10,018 - down 791 points - a level last seen on 21 July 2006. Renewed buying at lower levels helped the index cut losses and touch a high of 10,787 - a recovery of 769 points.

The Sensex, however, witnessed some selling pressure towards the end of the day and finally settled with a loss of 228 points at 10,581.

While the BSE Mid-cap index slipped 63 points to 3,657, the Small-cap index declined 107 points to 4,286.

The BSE Oil & Gas  and Capital Goods indices plunged over 5% each to 6,828 and 7,665, respectively. The IT index shed 4% at 2,669, and the Auto index dropped 3.5% to 3,196. On the other hand, the BSE Realty index surged over 5% to 2,813, and the FMCG index added 1.7% to 1,903.

The market breadth was fairly negative - out of 2,623 stocks traded, 1,733 declined, 833 advanced and the rest were unchanged today.

INDEX SHAKERS...

Hindalco tumbled over 12% to Rs 70. Tata Motors slumped over 11% to Rs 251.

TCS tanked over 8.5% to Rs 495. Grasim and Reliance shed 8% each at Rs 1,371 and Rs 1,397, respectively.

Larsen & Toubro dropped 7.5% to Rs 826. Mahindra & Mahindra plunged 6.7% to Rs 452.

BHEL slipped nearly 6% to Rs 1,313, and Infosys declined nearly 5% to Rs 1,267.

ONGC, HDFC Bank and ACC were down over 4% each at Rs 803, Rs 1,087 and Rs 523, respectively.

...AND THE MOVERS

Reliance Communications (RCom) zoomed nearly 10% to Rs 259. DFL soared over 8% to Rs 325.

Hindustan Unilever surged over 7% to Rs 248. HDFC rallied over 5% to Rs 1,801.

SBI advanced over 3% to Rs 1,544, and Jaiprakash Associates added 2.8% to Rs 75.

Sterlite moved up of 2% to Rs 299. Bharti Airtel was up 1.8% at Rs 731.

VALUE & VOLUME TOPPERS

Reliance topped the value chart with a turnover of nearly Rs 419 crore followed by Reliance Capital (Rs 258.55 crore), ICICI Bank (Rs 239.25 crore), SBI (Rs 212.85 crore) and Larsen & Toubro (Rs 170.60 crore).

IFCI led the volume chart with trades of around 1.21 crore shares followed by Chambal Fertilisers (1.16 crore), Reliance Natural Resources (1.08 crore), Indiabulls Realestate (96.90 lakh) and Suzlon Energy (86 lakh).