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Talk of fine HLL show sparks heavy buying; Sensex zooms 100 points to 3307.49

The Bombay Stock Exchange Sensex skyrocketed by 100 points crossing the 3300-mark as pivotals zoomed up on frenzied buying spree led by institutional investors and speculators on expectations of a 'spectacular' financial performance from Hindustan Lever Limited.

The marketmen are expecting about 25-30 per cent growth in HLL' s net profit. HLL is scheduled to announce its financial results on February 15. The HLL scrip alone shot up by Rs 151 to Rs 2033 by surpassing Rs 2000 mark at the BSE, while it closed higher at Rs 2019.60 at the National Stock Exchange.

The number of A group shares also recorded handsome gains during the single trading session today. The fast-moving consumer goods or FMCG sector, to which HLL belongs, were the front-runners along with pharmaceuticals. The high-profile infotech stocks reported marginal gain compared to the sidelined infotech counters, dealers said.

Telco, Voltas, Digital Equipment and Rolta, Tata Tea, BPL ,Dr Reddy's, and CMC were the other major gainers, they said.

Mirroring the bullish trend, the 30-scrip BSE Sensex opened at 3221.04 points, touched the day's high of 3308.88 points, touched the day's low of 3213.27 points, before closing at 3307.49 points as against the previous close of 3207.71 points.

The broad-based BSE-100 index also advanced by 44.71 points to 1454.32 points as against the previous close of 1409.61 points.

The BSE-200 and Dollex indices also gained by 8.27 and 3.24 points to 335.59 and 131.65 points as against the previous close of 327.32 and 128.41 points respectively.

The foreign financial institutions have actively participated after a long gap and made purchases in the heavy-weighted counters.

Among the issues, Asian Hotels rose by Rs 13 to Rs 189, BHEL Rs 17.70 to Rs 190, Castrol Rs 10.50 to Rs 833.50, Colgate Rs 4.30 to Rs 176.90, Dr Reddy's Rs 38 to Rs 618.25, Glaxo Rs 11.25 to Rs 638, Grasim Rs 5.40 to Rs 155, Hindalco Rs 7 to Rs 463, ITC Rs 9.75 to Rs 839.75, L&T Rs 4.70 to Rs 174.20, Ranbaxy Rs 3.50 to Rs 331.25, Reliance Rs 3.70 to Rs 123.20, Satyam Computers Rs 16.50 to Rs 900, SBI Rs 2.10 to Rs 154.10, Telco Rs 14.70 to Rs 198.70, Tisco Rs 3.20 to Rs 118.10, Tata Tea Rs 31.25 to Rs 393.50, Voltas Rs 7.80 to Rs 105.70

The few losers were Cadbury which dropped by Rs 6.25 to Rs 581, India Hotels Rs 6.50 to Rs 383.50, NIIT Rs 22.50 to Rs 2,367, Pentafour Software Rs 9.50 to Rs 843.50.

Total turnover on the BSE improved sharply to Rs 15.68 billion as against yesterday's turnover of Rs 13.98 billion.

Pentafour Software topped the list of turnover by registering the highest turnover of Rs 2.76 billion, followed by Satyam Computers Rs 1.49 billion, Tata Tea (Rs 1.31 billion), ITC Rs 1.25 billion.

Other actively traded counters were Hindustan Lever (Rs 827.5 million), Telco (Rs 559 million), Zee Telefilms (Rs 499.7 million), Reliance (Rs 426.2 million), Castrol (Rs 376.4 million), Dr Reddy's (Rs 320.6 million), MTNL (Rs 319.8 million), SBI (Rs 236.9 million), BHEL (Rs 222 million), Glaxo India (Rs 205.8 million) and Tisco (Rs 204.4 million).

UNI

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