Monday, September 12 2005 17:55 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Mumbai: The Sensex today (Sept 12, 2005) surpassed the 8100 level to hit yet another new peak at 8142.81, extending its winning streak to ninth straight session, in the liquid market with a sharp increase in the number of Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) registered with SEBI.

The Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) Benchmark 30-share Index (Sensex) rallied smartly to an all-time intra-trade high of 8142.81 before ending the day at a new closing peak of 8138.42 as against Friday's close of 8060.01, a net gain of 78.41 points or 0.97 per cent.

The sensex has gained by 504 points or 6.6 per cent in the nine-day long Bull Run between August 30 and September 12.

FIIs, which reported net investments of Rs 1405 crore in last week, have preferred India for investments in equity to a few other South East Asian countries because of attractive price earning ratio at around 15 to 20 per cent and very strong fundamentals governing the market, brokers said.

Asian countries like Taiwan, Korea and even China have reported degrowth in the current fiscal.

Operators and retailers too were believed to be creating positions on expectations of encouraging working results and strong technicals.

The sentiment was also boosted by firm trend in global markets coupled with a marked rise of 9.3 per cent in the index of industrial production (IIP) during April-July.

Birla group shares Indo Gulf Fert and Birla Global hogged the limelight on news of the group's plans of their merger into Indian Rayon.

RIL, ONGC, SBI, Bajaj Auto, HDFC, Grasim, ITC, TCS Ltd, HLL and Satyam Computers recorded impressive gains.

Small-cap counters also witnessed brisk activity. The BSE small-cap index soared by 75.35 points to 6113.54 from previous close of 6038.19.

The broad-based BSE-100 Index spurted further by 45.02 points to 4356.39 from previous close of 4311.37.

The BSE-200 Index and the Dollex-200 were quoted sharply up at 1053.40 and 400.23 at close compared to last weekend's close of 1042.41 and 396.14 respectively. The BSE-500 Index shot up by 35.65 points to 3402.50 from last close of 3366.85 and the Dollex-30 ended higher at 1524.79 from 1510.45. The volume of business fell sharply to Rs 3106.14 crore from Rs 3807.94 crores last Friday. Sterling Bio-tech remained the most active scrip with the highest turnover of Rs 153.02 crore followed by Sasken (Rs 134.45 crore), RIL (Rs 80.68 crore), Bharti Tele (Rs 74.19 crore) and SBI (Rs 48.67 crore).

RIL strengthened by 12.05 to 753.15, Grasim by 57.05 to1359.05, SBI by 12.85 to 867.80, ONGC by 14.20 to 1006.95, HLL by 3.60 to 169.15, HDFC by 16.25 to 932.30, Bajaj Auto by 34.75 to 1587.90, BHEL by 8.30 to 1096.75, Dr Reddy's Lab by 4.65 to 789.60, Satyam Computers by 7.45 to 538.95, TCS Ltd by 35.40 to 1427.40, Tata Power by 6.10 to 464.20, Infosys Tech by 7.20 to 2425.60, Hero Honda by 7.05 to 698.65 and Bharti Tele-Venture by 2.50 to 334.55.

However, HDFC Bank eased by 4.95 to 672.10, Maruti Udyog by 1.85 to 509.90, REL by 2.60 to 584.50, Tata Motors by 2.30 to 510.35 and L&T by 8.60 to 1330.15.