The Sensex opened with a positive gap of 66 points at 15,609, and touched a high of 15,661 in early deals. Profit-taking at higher levels limited the rally, and the index exhibited lacklustre movement for most of the trading session on Wednesday.

Selling in late trades saw the index slip to a low of 15,487 - down 174 points from the day's high. The Sensex finally ended with a loss of 37 points at 15,505.

The NSE Nifty ended at 4,496, down 1 point.

The market breadth was positive - out of 2,753 stocks traded, 1,537 advanced, 1,163 declined and 53 were unchanged on Wednesday.

Index Movers...

Reliance Energy [Get Quote] soared over 3% to Rs 888. Bajaj Auto [Get Quote] rallied 2.5% to Rs 2,392. Reliance moved up over 1% to Rs 2,013. HDFC [Get Quote] was up nearly 1% at Rs 2,166.

...And The Shakers

NTPC declined nearly 3% at Rs 190. ITC dropped 2% to Rs 180, and ICICI Bank [Get Quote] slipped 1.8% to Rs 885.

Cipla declined 1.5% to Rs 175. Hindalco [Get Quote], Satyam [Get Quote], Ambuja Cements and Larsen & Toubro were down around 1% each at Rs 155, Rs 429, Rs 142 and Rs 2,564, respectively.

Value and Volume Toppers

Reliance Capital [Get Quote] topped the value chart with a turnover of Rs 209.50 crore followed by Everonn Systems (Rs 154 crore), Reliance (Rs 151.40 crore), Larsen & Toubro (Rs 142 crore) and Reliance Energy (Rs 133 crore).

Tata Teleservices [Get Quote] led the volume chart with trades of around two crore shares followed by Nagarjuna Fertilisers (1.85 crore), Ispat Industries [Get Quote] (1.50 crore), IFCI (1.46 crore) and Vishal Exports (1.26  crore).