Monday, January 16 2006 17:30 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Mumbai: Even as investors prepared for a special price discovery trading session for index heavyweight Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL), the sensex today (Jan 16, 2006) dipped by 63 points, extending its losses to fifth straight day in volatile trade on sustained selling pressure amid FII slowdown.

Market players seemed to have adopted cautious approach and reduced their holdings in RIL a day before the company's demerger followed by a special trading session on January 18, for price discovery of its shares.

The Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) Benchmark 30-share Index (sensex) reacted negatively after early rally to 9,397.62 and dropped to the intra-day low of 9,287.09 before ending the day at 9,311.19 against Friday's close of 9,374.19, a net fall of 63.00 points or 0.67 per cent.

The market has fallen by 329.10 points or 3.41 per cent in the five days after January nine.

RIL attracted brisk activity and clocked heavy volume as the scrip witnessed heavy selling pressure throughout.

Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) and domestic mutual funds too were believed to be sellers during the day.

FIIs reported net sales of Rs 1,031 crore on January 10 and 12 while domestic funds were sellers to the tune of Rs 797 crore in the initial three days of last week.

Besides RIL, other heavyweighted counters Infosys Tech, Satyam Computers, SBI, Grasim, ITC, ICICI Bank, Tata Steel, HDFC and TCS Ltd recorded substantial losses due to selling pressure from investors.

ONGC, L&T, HDFC Bank and BHEL, however, scored handsome gains on fairly good buying support.