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Pivotals firm up on buying support; Nifty up 7 points to 897.80

Pivotals firmed up moderately on good buying support by domestic institutions and foreign institutional investors on the National Stock Exchange today.

Reflecting the upbeat sentiment, the S&P CNX Nifty index rose by seven points to 897.80 points from 890.80 points of the previous day.

The CNX Nifty Junior Index also rose by 22.40 points to 1552.50 points while the S&P CNX Defty edged up by 3.80 points to 730.65 points. The S&P CNX 500 appreciated by 6.24 points to 620.19 points and CNX Midcap 200 index moved up by 8.24 points to 558.21 points from 549.97 of the previous day.

Total turnover, involving 73.84 million shares in 245,622 trades, was Rs 18.20 billion. The debentures traded were worth Rs 3.21 million. The day's top gainers were: Colgate which shot up by 6.88 per cent to Rs 212, Grasim 6.44 per cent to 192.65, IFCI 4.75 per cent to Rs 17.65, Indian Rayon 4.39 per cent to Rs 119 and IDBI 3.67 per cent to Rs 38.15.

The day's top losers were: Tisco declined by 2.66 per cent to Rs 120.70, Tata Power by 1.56 per cent to Rs 104.25, Castrol by 1.37 per cent to Rs 755.90, HPCL 0.94 per cent to Rs 231.60 and Asea Brown Boveri 0.55 per cent to Rs 501.50.

The net investment by domestic financial institutions and foreign institutional investors were worth Rs 107.9 million and Rs 47.5 million respectively.

Pentafour Software registered the highest turnover with Rs 3.72 billion, followed by ITC (Rs 2.97 billion), Satyam Computers (Rs 1.91 billion), Reliance (Rs 1.12 billion), Zee Telefilms (Rs 721.4 million), SBI New (Rs 617.5 million), Telco (Rs 586.3 million), HCL-HP (Rs 493.7 million), Tata Tea (Rs 485.1 million), Dabur (Rs 478.7 million) and Silverline (Rs 429.1 million).

The other actively traded counters were: Tisco (Rs 351.6 million), Castrol (Rs 282.8 million), ACC (Rs 263.4 million), L&T (Rs 234.2 million), Square D Software (Rs 217.5 million) and Dr Reddy's (Rs 187.9 million).

The wholesale debt market of the NSE witnessed trades worth Rs 4.14 billion. The 11.40 per cent government loan maturing in 2000 was traded for Rs 650 million at a weighted yield of 11.32 per cent. The 11.55 per cent government loan maturing in 2001 was traded for Rs 650 million at a weighted yield of 11.51 per cent. Non-SLR bond of MTNL maturing in 1999 was traded for Rs 100 million at yield of 11.51 per cent.

Commercial paper of Grasim Limited maturing on February 8, 1999 was traded for Rs 50 million at a yield of 10.10 per cent. The turnover in debenture traded today was Rs 32.2 million.

UNI

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