Sensex spurts by 172 pts; closes at 14,282.72 pts

Mumbai, Jan 25: The Sensex today spurted by 172.26 points on the Bombay Stock Exchange and closed at 14,282.72 points on sustained heavy speculative demand from Foreign Institutional Investors (FII's) and mutual funds.

The Sensex kept on extending gains as the day progressed, and a sudden spurt was witnessed towards the fag end of the trading session as traders rushed to cover their short positions, with January 2007 derivatives contracts expiring today. Sensex surged to hit a high of 14,307.19, in late trading.

The barometer index settled 172.26 points or 1.22 per cent higher at 14,282.72, an all time closing high. It opened at 14,151.62. Its low for the day was at 14,115.40 The S&P CNX Nifty index of NSE was up 57.80 points or 1.41 per cent to 4147.70, also an all time closing high before it resumed high at 4092.05 points. The Nifty index recorded a high at 4157.95 points and a low at 4090.10 points during the session.

The total turnover on BSE amounted to Rs 4680 crore, as compared to 4470 crore on Wednesday.

The market breadth was strong on BSE, as buying spilled over to small-cap and mid-cap stocks as well. 1424 shares advanced, as compared to 1194 that declined. 72 shares remained unchanged.

Among the Sensex pack, 27 advanced while the rest declined The BSE METAL and CG indices also jumped up by 396.55 points and 161.27 points respectively. They closed at 9630.45 points for METAL index and for CG index at 9630.21 points, followed by PSU index by 92.20 and touched 6324.09 points, BANKEX index by 63.01 points and quoted at 7446.83 points, MID CAP index by 60.50 points and touched 6088.98 points, TECK index by 55.06 and quoted at 3777.26 points, AUTO index by 51.86 and touched 5591.64 points and OIL&GAS index by 51.69 points and closed at 6690.91 points.

Asian markets were trading on a weak note. The Nikkei was down 0.28 per cent at 17,458.30, having earlier hit 17,617.64, its highest since July 2000 as investors grabbed profits in Honda Motor Co. Ltd. and other recent gainers following a rise in the yen.

The Hang Seng index lost 0.73 per cent to 20,669.83 while The Shanghai Composite was down 3.96 per cent to 2,857.36 The Dow Jones industrial average was up 87.97 points, or 0.70 per cent, at 12,621.77. The Standard&Poor's 500 Index was up 12.14 points, or 0.85 per cent, at 1,440.13.

The Nasdaq Composite Index was up by 34.87 points, or 1.43 per cent, at 2,466.28.

NYMEX crude for March delivery eased by 13 cents, or around a quarter of a percent, to USD 55.24 a barrel.

UNI