Mumbai: The Sensex ignored the fag-end selling and completed its four-session gaining streak on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) today (Apr 5, 2004) by closing 49.94 points higher at 5,838.02 following sustained buying by Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) and operators.

IT and Capital Goods counters were in the forefront on good institutional buying while select banking stocks reacted downwards on late profit booking, dealers said.

Led by IT bellwether Infosys Tech, software shares made a dramatic comeback on fresh buying by institutional investors as well as operators due to firm Wall Street advices where the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index rose by 42.16 points last Friday and 97.15 points in the last weekend.

Besides IT segment, capital goods scrips like ABB, Alfa Laval, BEL, BHEL, Bh Forge, Crompton Gr, Siemens and Thermax also attracted heavy buying and ended with sharp gains.

The BSE-30 share sensitive index opened higher at 5,809.74 as against last Friday's (Apr 2, 2004) close of 5,788.08 and gradually moved upwards past 5,900-mark to a high of 5,905.35.

Later, profit selling at the fag end pulled the index down to a low of 5,798.37 before concluding at 5,838.02, a rise of 0.86 per cent. Sensex flared up by a whopping 317.58 points or 5.75 per cent in the past four sessions.

The broad-based BSE-100 index also improved by 25.32 points to end at 3.100.55 from previous close of 3,075.23.

Index-based heavyweights like Infosys Tech, RIL, Grasim, L&T, Hindalco, Tata Motors, Tata Powers, Tisco, Wipro, Satyam Computer and BHEL notched sharp gains, which has been reflected in the Sensex.