Sensex down 17 points at 12,373

The Sensex opened on a flat note at 12,391, but moved up to a high of 12,434 in morning deals. After moving in a narrow range, the index slipped to a low of 12,358 in noon deals. The Sensex finally closed with a loss of 17 points at 12,373.

The sectoral indices largely finished with gains today. The BSE Metal Index gained over 1% (97 points) to 8687. The BSE Oil & Gas Index moved up nearly 1% (52 points) to 5815. The BSE Capital Goods, Consumer Durables and SmallCap indices gained 1% each today.

The broad market sentiment was bullish - out of 2,577 scrips traded, 1,592 advanced, 933 declined and 52 were unchanged today.

INDEX GAINERS & LOSERS

Hindalco advanced over 2% (Rs 4) to Rs 176. Reliance Communications moved up 1.6% (Rs 5) to Rs 354.

While Reliance was up Rs 8 at Rs 1,163, Infosys was up Rs 6 at Rs 1,872. Gujarat Ambuja, L&T,

Bharti, BHEL and ACC also finished with gains today.

HLL slipped nearly 2% (Rs 5) to Rs 245. HDFC dropped 1.5% (Rs 22) to Rs 1,431.  Wipro, Satyam and TCS declined to Rs 514, Rs 811 and Rs 993, respectively.

VOLUME & VALUE TOPPERS

Debutant Usher Agro topped the volume chart with trades of over 93 lakh shares followed by Silverline (73 lakh), Petronet (72 lakh), Essar Shipping (51 lakh) and SAIL (47 lakh).

VSNL topped the value chart with a turnover of Rs 192 crore followed by Reliance (Rs 128 crore), Bombay Rayon (Rs 87 crore), Tata Steel (Rs 68 crore) and HPCL (Rs 66 crore).