Mumbai: Global bearishness continued to weigh heavily on the Stock Exchange (BSE) today (Mar 12, 2004) with the sensex showing no sign of any recovery at opening session following sustained profit-selling by operators and local funds.

Lack of follow-up support from Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) who slowed their activities was also partly responsible for the downtrend.

On Wall Street, the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the tech-laden Nasdaq Composite Index crashed by 168.51 points and 20.26 points last night (Mar 11, 2004) respectively.

From Southeast Asian markets, the Hang Seng tumbled by nearly 256 points, the Nikkei by 205 points and Singapore ST Index by 19 points at early trading today.

Advance tax payment, March year-end and new IPOs were also contributed to the sensex fall as operators opted to book profits to keep cash in hand.

The BSE-30 share sensitive index opened lower at 5632.13 and gradually moved downwards below 5600-mark at 5593.76 before being quoted at 5604.27 at 10.30 hrs (IST).

Index-based shares like RIL, Tata Motors, Tisco, Tata Power, SBI, REL, Ranbaxy, ONGC, L&T, ITC, HPCL, Hindalco, HDFC Bank, Grasim, Dr Reddy and BHEL suffered a marked setback at early stages.

However, NIIT, EIH Ltd, Bharti Tele, Polaris, IOB, Visuals Soft and Bajaj Auto showed marked gains.