Sensex regains lost ground, up by 178 points

Mumbai, Jul 10: The BSE Sensex swung 243 points and closed 174 points up at 10,684.73, on cues from the global markets after they shrugged-off their fear of another Fed rate hike.

The Government data for job requirements in US has turned out to be much lower than expected, leading to rise in the US stocks on Dow Jones and Nasdaq.

The Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) sensitive index (Sensex) closed at 10,684.73 points today, as compared to the previous close of 10,509.53. The index touched a high of 10,704 and a low of 10,461.73 in the intra-day trading today.

BSE sectoral indices also registered gains, after a less than average performance today in the earlier two trading sessions.

IT sector was up by 3.23 per cent, Teck was up by 3.18 per cent, PSU was up by 1.74 per cent, oil and gas by 1.67 per cent, metals by 1.22 per cent, FMCG by 0.39 per cent and midcap by 0.31 per cent.

The smallcap and bankex index were down by 0.09 and 0.39 per cent.

The gainers on the index were - Bharti Tele, Wipro, ONGC, Maruti Udyog, Gujarat Ambuja, HDFC, TCS and Infosys, all down between 2.78 and 5.14 per cent.

The losers were ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank and ITC, down by 1.28 per cent, 0.78 per cent and 0.17 per cent, respectively.

Amongst the gainers, IT shares surged on expectations that firms may raise their earnings and revenue guidance for FY-07 due to strong volume growth and depreciation of the rupee against the US dollar.

i-Flex solutions jumped 6.5 per cent to Rs 1,211, Wipro rose 5 per cent to Rs 494, HCL Tech gained 5 per cent to Rs 517, TCS rose 3 per cent to Rs 1,804, Infosys gained 2.7 per cent to Rs 3,190 and Satyam Computer gained 2.6 per cent to Rs 710.

Oil and gas major ONGC rose 4 per cent to Rs 1,136.15 and GAIL gained 2.6 per cent to Rs 254.

Metal shares advanced, tracking firm metal prices on LME and on the back of recent hike in domestic prices. Sterlite Industries rose 4.4 per cent to Rs 425 and Hindalco rose 2.3 per cent to Rs 172.65.

Hindustan Zinc gained nearly 4 per cent to Rs 600, the company raised the price of zinc to Rs 1,79,400 a tonne.

Reliance Communications (RCL) rose 3.3 per cent to Rs 256, boosted by reports that it had won a bandwidth order from China Netcom for an estimated value of US dollar 35 million. RIL gained 1.1 per cent to Rs 1,043.50.

Cement shares advanced due to a strong outlook for cement prices over the medium-term and on expectations of strong Q1 results this fiscal. Gujarat Ambuja Cements gained 3.3 per cent to Rs 103.45, ACC rose 2.2 per cent to Rs 811.45 and Grasim rose 1.5 per cent to Rs 1,930.50.

The breadth in the broader market was in favour of 1,307 declines against 1,037 advances, out of total 2,415 shares traded on the BSE today.

UNI