Mumbai: Led by oil majors HPCL (Hindustan Petroleum Corporation Limited) and BPCL (Bharat Petroleum Corporation Limited), old-economy shares continued their northward journey, pushing the benchmark up by yet another 17.53 points to close at 2993 on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) on May 6 on sustained buying from foreign funds and operators.

Public Sector Undertakings (PSUs) and power shares were mainly in the forefront, attracting good buying enquiries from institutional investors as well as retail investors.

Power stocks stole the limelight following approval of the Electricity Bill by Parliament after Rajya Sabha passed it by a voice vote on May 5, incorporating several recommendations of the Parliamentary Standing Committee, a major step to reforms in this sector, a dealer commented.

Select auto and cement scrips also witnessed firm trend on good investment buying.

Majority of banking stocks which were in keen demand at early stages, later met with profit-selling, showing a mixed bag at close.

The BSE-30 share sensitive index opened firm at 2981.87 as against yesterday's close of 2975.47 and briefly crossed psychological 3000-barrier to a high of 3001.21, before mild profit-selling pared part of the gains to settle at 2993.00, a rise of 0.59 per cent.

The BSE-100 index also improved further by 10.60 points to close at 1501.93 from previous close of 1491.33.

Barring front-line IT shares like Infosys Tech, Satyam Computer and Wipro, which ended in positive territory, most of the other second-line software stocks declined on selling.

PTI