Friday, February 4 2005 17:20 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Mumbai: After a firm start, prices met with heavy profit-selling at higher levels and declined sharply with the Sensex ending the day marginally lower at 6618.23 on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) today (Feb 4, 2005).

The initial firmness was short-lived as market lost steam due to fresh selling mainly by domestic funds in some of the index heavyweights, technology and PSUs.

The 30-share sensitive index started the day on a strong note at 6635.85 as against yesterday's close of 6619.97 and shot up further to scale an intra-day high of 6684.16 within half an hour of trading. Thereafter, it fell sharply to a low of 6571.51, but recovered towards the fag-end and closed at 6618.23, showing a moderate loss of 1.74 points or 0.03 per cent over the last close.

Fall in inflation which dropped by 0.05 per cent to a 34-week low of 5.37 per cent for the week ended January 22, failed to have any positive impact on the market sentiment, dealers said.

However, the market fundamentals were strong and prices were expected to open firm on Monday when the market reopens, they said.

Fall in index-based shares like Reliance Industries, BHEL, Infosys, ONGC, Tata Motors, Satyam Computers, L&T, HDFC Bank and State Bank caused the Sensex to close weak.

Other weak spots were Bharti, GACL, ICICI Bank, HPCL, REL and Tata Power.

However, ACC, HDFC, Hero Honda, Hindalco, ITC, Ranbaxy, Bajaj Auto, Dr Reddy, Grasim and Wipro rose smartly which minimised the index fall.