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Bulls, bears share 'honours'; Sensex down over 18 points, 2974.83

Equities could not sustain initial gains, which resulted in the Sensex crossing the psychological 3000 mark, but falling below it at the end of trading at the Bombay Stock Exchange today.

The market opened on overnight buying spree by the bull operators and domestic institutional investors coupled with limited support from foreign institutional investors which spurted the equity prices and lifted Sensex to over 3000 points.

However, in the afternoon, bear operators covered their short positions a day before the end of the current settlement cycle, which led the Sensex to drift lower.

Local players like Unit Trust of India, Life Insurance Corporation of India and General Insurance Corporation of India continued their buying support which restricted the heavy downfall in the equity prices, leading brokers said.

Continuing turmoil in the Russian economy and a fall in the Dow Jones Industrial Index have shaken the world markets as the Russian goverment failed to infuse confidence in the nation's shaky banking system, dealers said.

Reflecting the downtrend, the BSE Sensitive Index (30 scrips) (Sensex) opened higher at 3006.65 points, moved gradually up to 3040.48 points before closing at 2974.83 points, suffering a net loss of 18.53 points as against the previous close of 2993.36 points.

The broad-based BSE National Index (100 scrips) finished at 1331.21 points, losing 07.97 points over Tuesday's close of 1339.18 points.

The BSE-200 and Dollex indices settled down at 310.60 and 121.54 points as compared to last trading day's close of 312.49 and 122.42 points, decreasing 01.89 and 0.88 points respectively.

The Unit Trust of India invested good amount with Hindustan Lever, State Bank of India, Bombay Suburban Electric Supply and IPCL counters, the brokers added.

The total turnover on the screen-based trading system was Rs 10.68 billion involving 40.5 million shares in 120,359 trades in BOLT system.

The ITC registered highest turnover of Rs 2.73 billion followed by Satyam Computers Rs 1.58 billion, Zee Telefilms Rs 679.7 million, Pentafour Software Rs 668.4 million, SBI Rs 551.1 million, RIL Rs 494.7 million, L&T Rs 307.1 million, Dr Reddy's Rs 275.1 million, MTNL Rs 227 million, Tata Tea Rs 226.2 million, Castrol India Rs 202.8 million, Infosys Tech Rs 157.1 million, Gujarat Ambuja Rs 126 million, Bajaj Auto Rs 108 million, Telco Rs 104.7 million in specified counters.

A good transaction was witnessed at Marico Indus (Rs 58.9 million), HCL Infosyst (Rs 50.8 million), DSQ Software (Rs 40.5 million), Silverline (Rs 34.5 million), BFL Software (Rs 31.1 million), Bausch and Lomb (Rs 30.5 million), Rolta (Rs 30.4 million), Pentafour Communication (Rs 16.6 million), Software Solution (Rs 13.1 million), Madura Coats (Rs 12.4 million), Amara Raja Batteries (Rs 10.8 million), Bata India (Rs 9.3 million) at B1 counters.

UNI