Mumbai: The market gave up early gains and ended lower by 20 points on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) today (May 26, 2004) on late selling pressure from institutional investors and squaring up by operators.

Initially, the BSE benchmark 30-share index showed signs of a fresh rally rising to the intra-day high at 5,163.61 on short covering by operators enthused by positive Foreign Institutional Investor (FII) inflows on Monday (May 24, 2004). FIIs reported meagre net investments of Rs 28 crore after a long stint of net sales.

The Sensex, however, failed to maintain higher levels as FIIs reportedly pressed sales in blue chip counters in the latter part of the session and ended at 5,081.95 as against yesterday's close of 5,102.22, netting a loss of 20.27 points or 0.39 per cent.

Early upsurge was partly attributed to overnight sharp rally on Wall Street. The Dow Jones Industrial Average spurted by about 159 points and the Nasdaq Composite Index closed up by 41.67 points yesterday.

Brokers said operators covered short positions in the Futures and Options at early stages ahead of the expiry of May Contract tomorrow, but were believed to have booked profits during the last one hour as FIIs turned sellers at higher price levels.