BSE Sensex opens high at 12,655.94 points

Mumbai, Mar 20: The BSE Sensex today resumed firm at 12,655.94 points against its previous day's close of 12,644.99 points on fresh speculative demand from FIIs and mutual funds, brokers said.

The market surged in opening trade tracking firm Asian markets.

Debutante Astral Poly Technik, however, became another firm to list meekly on the bourses.

At present the Bombay Stock Exchange(BSE) Sensitive Index (Sensex) is up by 73 points, at 12,718.

Cement shares surged following a report that the government may offer a five-year tax break to cement plants set up after April 1, 2007. Gujarat Ambuja Cements surged by four per cent to Rs 111.60, Grasim gained by two per cent to Rs 2,086.20 and ACC rose by 1.9 per cent to Rs 753.80.

Maruti Udyog (MUL) hiked by 0.8 per cent to Rs 795.90, amid reports that it had raised prices of its Swift diesel version between Rs 4,000 and Rs 7,000.

Reliance Communications rose by 2.5 per cent to Rs 407.25, extending yesterday's gains. The company said yesterday the Bombay High Court had approved the demerger of the passive infrastructure consisting of the wireless towers (CDMA and GSM) and related infrastructure of the company and Reliance Telecom to Reliance Telecom Infrastructure.

Index heavyweight Reliance Industries (RIL) gained by 0.6 per cent to Rs 1,323. A strong 49,198 shares changed hands in the counter on BSE.

Astral Poly Technik was trading at Rs 103.90, a discount of 9.6 per cent over IPO price of Rs 115.

Asian markets held firm after the Bank of Japan today kept interest rates unchanged at 0.5 per cent. Japan's Nikkei was up 1.1 per cent. Analysts will now scrutinise remarks of the Governor of the Central Bank at a news conference later in the day, for clues on the timing of the next rate rise. Key benchmark indices in Hong Kong, Singapore and Taiwan were up between 0.29 and 0.75 per cent.

US stocks rallied yesterday after Britain's Barclays and Dutch ABN AMRO confirmed they were in talks to merge, helping the financial sector recover from its recent hammering in the sub-prime mortgage market turmoil.

The Dow Jones industrial average ended up by 115.76 points, or 0.96 per cent, at 12,226.17. The Standard&Poor's 500 Index closed up 15.11 points, or 1.09 per cent, at 1,402.06.

The NASDAQ Composite Index finished up by 21.75 points, or 0.92 per cent, at 2,394.41 yesterday, brokers added.

UNI