Positive cues from the global markets, coupled with follow-up buying (after the late buying binge yesterday) in early trades, saw the Sensex open with a positive gap of 42 points at 13,823.

All-round buying saw the index surge to a high of 13,977 - up 196 points - in the morning session.

The index, thereafter, consolidated at higher levels before sliding in late noon trades. Aggressive selling, mainly in oil & gas stocks, saw the index tumble to a low of 13,745 - down 232 points from the day's high. The Sensex finally settled with a marginal loss of 10 points at 13,771.

While the Metal index gained 1.4% to 10,107, the Oil & Gas index slipped 1% to 7156.

The market breadth turned negative towards the close - out of 2,634 stocks traded, 1,328 declined, 1,238 advanced and 68 were unchanged today.

A mixed bag

HDFC soared over 5% to Rs 1,680. Tata Steel surged 2.5% to Rs 576.

HDFC Bank and ITC rallied 1.7% each to Rs 1,014 and Rs 163, respectively. Bajaj Auto and Hindalco gained around 1.5% each to Rs 2,604 and Rs 146, respectively.

ONGC and NTPC slipped over 2% each to Rs 889 and Rs 151, respectively. Ranbaxy dropped 1.8% to Rs 386.

Tata Motors, Larsen & Toubro, Maruti and Reliance were down around 1% each at Rs 714, Rs 1,691, Rs 795 and Rs 1,581, respectively.

Value & volume toppers

Indiabulls Real Estate topped the value chart with a turnover of Rs 190 crore followed by Page Industries (Rs 134 crore), Tata Steel (Rs 131.30 crore), Rolta (Rs 126 crore) and Orbit Corp (Rs 122.80 crore).

Reliance Natural led the volume chart with trades of around 1.77 crore shares followed by IFCI (1.20 crore), Nagarjuna Fertilisers (86.40 lakh), Orbit Corp (59 lakh) and Fortis (54.50 lakh).