Tuesday, February 1 2005 17:46 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Mumbai: In erratic movements, the market today (Feb 1, 2005) ended with a minor fall even as majority of blue chip counters suffered a sharp setback as investors booked profits at the higher levels despite fresh FII inflows.

Had it not been for sharp gains in heavyweights like HLL, Hindalco, Bajaj Auto, BHEL, REL and ONGC, the Sensex would have shown a marked fall.

The BSE Benchmark 30-share Index opened on a promising start and later fluctuated between 6586.66 and 6508.84 before ending the day at 6552.47 as against yesterday's close of 6555.94, a net fall of 3.47 points or 0.05 per cent.

Despite heavy FII inflows at the last month-end coupled with indications of some tax relief to corporates in the budget, retailers and traders took the opportunity of a strong price rally during last four sessions and booked profits at higher price levels, brokers said.

The market met with a strong resistance at every upsurge during the day ignoring heavy net investments of Rs 830.70 crore on January 27 and 28 by Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs), which had slowed down activity earlier in the month.

FIIs were believed to be buyers in blue chips including HLL, Bajaj Auto, Hindalco, BHEL and a few others.

Defending today's negative reaction, brokers said the market was expected to get some resistance after a massive jump of about 450 points in the last four days.

The market, however, is seen to be bullish and likely to witness a fresh upsurge on high expectations from the budget.

RIL, SBI, Wipro, Satyam Computer, Tata Motor, Tata Steel, Dr Reddy's and ITC recorded marked falls.