Mumbai: Bullish fervour got a fresh impetus as IT stocks rallied sharply aiding the SENSEX to end stronger by another 50 points in brisk activity at the Bombay Stock (BSE) on August 20 on sustained purchases by speculators as well as Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs).

IT counters hogged the limelight and finished with sharp rises on heavy buying in response to the second consecutive rally in the Nasdaq Composite Index that closed at 16-month high last night, brokers said adding that the IT bellwether Infosys Technologies that has high weightage in the BSE barometer shot up by over five per cent.

Other sharp gainers included heavyweights like SBI, HLL, Grasim Ind, Satyam Computers, HCL Tech, HPCL, Bajaj Auto, BHEL and several second-line software counters.

The BSE Benchmark 30-share Index opened on a strong footing and gradually moved upwards to the intra-day high at 4066.03 before ending at 4056.60 as against yesterday's (Aug 19) close of 4006.91, a net rise of 49.69 points or 1.24 per cent.

The broad-based BSE-100 Index advanced moderately by 12.56 points to 2085.40 from previous close of 2072.84.

The sudden rally in IT sector was partly attributed to reports that global chip-maker Intel would invest $ 20 million through its venture capital arm Intel Capital for a 20-25 per cent stake in Satyam Computers Services' business process outsourcing (BPO) subsidiary Nipuna.

However, Steel scrips Tisco, SAIL, Jindal Steel and others dropped further due to selling by local financial institutions, which reportedly booked profits in several blue-chip stocks at the prevailing higher price levels.

PTI