Friday, November 18 2005 17:14 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Mumbai`: A steep rally in auto and cement counters, pushed the Sensex up by 37.13 points to end at 8686.65 and extended its rising streak for the sixth straight sessions today (Nov 17, 2005) on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) on sustained heavy buying on the back of firm global advices.

The BSE benchmark 30-share sensitive index opened the day on a strong note at 8669.84 and after fluctuating in a range of 8739.57 and 8661.60, closed at 8686.65, showing a gain of 0.43 per cent over yesterday's close of 8649.52.

With today's rise, the index had gained by a massive 377.87 points or 4.55 per cent in the last six sessions.

Heavy buying activity by operators and domestic mutual funds and to some extent sustained support from Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) helped the market to scale such heights, brokers said.

Steep fall in world crude oil prices and a drop in inflation also boosted the market sentiment.

New York's main contract, light sweet crude for delivery in December fell sharply to 56.33 dollars a barrel, the lowest close by crude futures here since June 15, while in London, the price of Brent North Sea crude for January delivery slid 1.15 dollars to end trade at 54.85 dollars a barrel yesterday.

Meanwhile, inflation dropped to 4.14 per cent for the week ended November five from 4.75 per cent in the previous week.

In the global front, Dow Jones Industrial Average rallied by 45.46 points and the Nadaq Composite Index by 32.53 points, while in the Asian market, the Nikkei firmed up by 211.33 points, Hang Seng by 95.34 points, Singapore ST by 31.71 point and Taiwan by 85.80 points.