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Speculative selling keeps prices down; Sensex down 21 points, 2968.75

Equities suffered a moderate setback on the Bombay Stock Exchange following speculative selling pressure from foreign institutional investors and local operators on the last day of weekly trading cycle.

Reflecting the weak trend, the 30-scrip BSE Sensex opened on a steady note at 2993.68 points, touched the day's high of 3005.44 points, fell below the 3000-mark to touch day's low of 2960.24 and finally ended at 2968.75 points, showing a net loss of 21.47 points against the previous close of 2990.22 points.

Most of the marketmen were busy in squaring up their positions on the last day of settlement. The BSE also curtailed its trading session by one-and-a-half-hours by closing the session at 2 pm to facilitate the members to participate in special badla trading session.

The BSE conducted badla session after the trading hours today in view of Independence Day holiday on tomorrow August 15 (Saturday), BSE sources said.

Leading brokers said that business volume was very thin and there was no action in the market .

The continuous downtrend in Asian stock markets, fall in rupee value against the American greenback at the interbank forex market against US dollar had a direct impact on the Indian bourses which witnessed a downtrend during the week except yesterday due to heavy unloading by FIIs and major players.

The market reacted positively yesterday to the news that the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam-led front meeting will not withdraw support to the Union government.

Commenting on the reversal of trading on the BSE, a leading broker said that yesterday's rally was ''technical'' and could not sustained for long.

Meanwhile, the broad-based BSE-100 index drifted lower by 9.19 points to 1325.59 points against the previous close of 1334.78. The BSE-200 and Dollex indices closed lower by 1.79 and 0.39 points to 307.20 and 118.72 against the previous close of 308.99 and 119.11 points respectively.

Total turnover on the screen-based BOLT system reported during the day declined sharply to Rs 6.13 billion from yesterday's turnover of Rs 9.84 billion.

ITC registered highest business volume of Rs 989.8 million, followed by Satyam Computers Rs 872.8 million, Zee Telefilms Rs 673.7 million, Pentafour Softwaree Rs 465.6 million, Reliance Rs 422.5 million, State Bank of India Rs 305 million, Infosys Tech Rs 167.1 million, Tata Tea Rs 150.7 million, BHEL Rs 132.8 million, Telco Rs 121 million, L&T Rs 114.1 million, Castrol India Rs 84.4 million, Dr Reddy's Rs 83.4 million, Hindustan Lever Rs 80.1 million and MTNL Rs 48.7 million.

UNI