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Nifty climbs 0.2 points; 906.2

Equities moved in a narrow range, before closing marginally higher at the National Stock Exchange here today.

The Standard and Poor Crisil National Exchange Nifty index ended slightly higher at 906.2 points, as against the previous closing of 906 points. The index opened at 905.65 points, witnessing a high and low of 913.45 points and 903.15 points respectively.

The S & P CNX Nifty junior closed at 1429 points as compared to the last close of 1427.70 points, showing a net gain of 1.30 points. The S & P CNX Defty index ended higher by 0.55 points at 738.35 points as compared to 737.80 points yesterday.

S & P CNX 500 equity index closed at 605.62 points as against the previous close of 606.14 points, exhibiting a loss of 0.52 points. The CNX Midcap 200 Index ended lower by 3.52 points at 509.50 points from 513.02 points. Twenty-five securities hit their price bands.

The value of securities traded was worth Rs 9.91 billion, resulting from 154,193 trades. The value of debentures traded was Rs 1.37 million.

Tobacco major ITC recorded the maximum turnover with Rs 2.50 billion, followed by Satyam Computers (Rs 1.34 billion), Pentafour (Rs 604.3 million), ACC (Rs 554.1 million), Zee Telefilms (Rs 494.8 million), SBI (Rs 458.7 million), Reliance (Rs 423.6 million), Tata Tea (Rs 419 million) and Castrol (Rs 243.3 million).

The major scrips that advanced were ICICI, Indian Hotels, Thermax, HPCL and MTNL. Prominent among those that declined were Colgate, Gujarat Ambuja, Grasim, M and M and L & T.

FIIs were net sellers of shares valued at Rs 6.92 billion while financial institutions and mutual funds bought shares of a net value of 4.61 billion.

The wholesale NSE debt market witnessed trading worth Rs 3.92 billion. The zero coupon government bond maturing in 2000 (Series III) was traded for Rs 300 million at a weighted yield of 10.95 per cent. The 11.64 per cent government loan maturing in 2000 was also traded for Rs 300 million at a weighted yield of 10.97 percent. Government loans maturing in 2001 was traded for Rs 580 million at a weighted yield of 11.48 per cent.

The total traded value today was Rs 3.92 billion. The total traded value for the week was Rs 7.1 billion and the total value of traded debentures was Rs 59.89 million.

UNI