Tuesday, August 16 2005 10:54 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Mumbai: The Sensex today (Aug 16, 2005) witnessed erratic movements after opening on a promising note and was quoted up by 14 points at 10.30 am on alternate bouts of buying and selling by investors.

The BSE Benchmark 30-share Index opened moderately up at 7774.27 as against Friday's close of 7767.49 and later moved in a range of 7828.01 and 7753.54 before being quoted at 7753.54 at 10.30 am, down by 13.78 points.

Attributing selling pressure from domestic investors to concerns over high global oil prices, brokers said operators and retailers preferred to book profits at the higher levels even as the principal driving force Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) slowed down activity during last week.

Investors seemed to be cautious due to a likely hike in prices of petroleum products in line with the spurt in global crude prices.

The Petroleum Ministry has already proposed a Rs 3.25 per litre hike in petrol and about Rs four per litre increase in diesel prices.

Key stocks like Tata Motors, SBI, Satyam Computers, L&T, Infosys Technologies, ICICI Bank, Hero Honda, Grasim, Dr Reddy's Lab and TCS Ltd were quoted moderately lower due to selling pressure.

However, Tata Steel, Wipro, ITC, GACL, ACC, Bajaj Auto, Bharti Tele-Venture, BHEL and Cipla showed marked gains on buying support.