Mumbai: The SENSEX opened weak and generally moved downwards in extremely narrow range at early stages on Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) on July 19 as key stocks reacted negatively to a fresh meltdown in global markets.

The BSE Sensitive Index opened moderately lower at 3,239.66 as against the previous close of 3,245.74 and later moved in a small range of 3,245.13 and 3,228.86 before being quoted at 3,234.95 at 10.30 am (IST).

Investors reacted quickly to a sharp fall on Wall Street that pushed the Dow Jones Industrial Average by 132.99 points and the NASDAQ Composite Index by 40.30 points on July 18.

South East Asian market also started on a weak footing with Nikkei and the Hang Seng being quoted lower by 287.09 points and 129.56 points on July 19 morning respectively.

Heavyweight shares like Infosys Technologies, HPCL, HCL Techno, Satyam Computers and a few others showed noticeable losses on fresh selling pressure. Wipro suffered a sharp setback following the company's announcement of first quarter results, which was far below than the market projections.

However, Ranbaxy Lab rallied smartly on encouraging performance in the quarter ended June 30. The company reported a 190 per cent jump in net profit at 138.4 crore and also declared a bonus issue in the ratio of 3:5. PTI