Sensex down by 60.58 points

Mumbai, June 13 (UNI) After the bullish phase for last two days, the key benchmark Sensex of the Bombay Stock Exchange today ended in the red at 15,189.62 with a small loss of 60.58 points in volatile trade with the inflation rate zooming up to 8.75 per cent.

The select metal, realty, oils-gas and power stocks closed in red after witnessing volatility throughout the day. It seemed that the higher inflation numbers had a bearing on the markets.

The market had opened up in the morning session and tried to hold on to the gains but was not able to maintain the trend and turned choppy. There was modest selling pressure in metal, realty, power, FMCG and some oil stocks.

A near term trigger for the market will be corporate advance tax payments for the first installment, which falls due on June 15.

The income tax law requires a company to pay 15 per cent of the estimated tax liability for the year as advance tax as the first installment. The advance tax payment by the corporate sector will give a cue on Q1 June 2008 results.

Inflation based on the the wholesale price index rose to 8.75 pc in the week ended May 31, above the previous week's rise of 8.24 pc, government data released today.

European stocks drifted lower, trimming some of the previous session's gains as inflation worries and remained high on investors' minds ahead of US consumer price data. Key benchmark indices in France, Germany and UK were down by between 0.66 pc to 0.79 pc which affected the downward trend at the Indian bourses, brokers pointed out.

In a relatively range bound trade, the 30-share BSE Sensex lost 60.58 points or 0.40 per cent at 15,189.62 from its last finish. At the day's low of 15,135.81, Sensex lost 114.39 points in mid-afternoon trade. At the day's high of 15,337.10, Sensex gained 86.9 points in early trade.

The BSE clocked a turnover of Rs 5,827 crore today as compared to a turnover of Rs 6,233.42 crore on June 12.

The broader based S&P CNX Nifty index of National stock Exchange (NSE) also ended low at 4517.10 point, 22.25 points or 0.49 pc down from its last finish of 4539.35, the previous day.

Ranbaxy Laboratories has been star of the day. The stock jumped by 4.31 pc to close at Rs 566.90 after the news that Pfizer is exploring possibility of counter offer for Ranbaxy and sent feelers to institutions, as per sources. Institutions hold 41.28 pc stake in Ranbaxy Labs, in which LIC is the major holder with 15.8 pc stake.

Total turnover traded by the markets stood at Rs 58736.04 crore.

This includes Rs 11899.32 crore from NSE Cash segment, Rs 41003.4 crore from NSE F&O and the balance Rs 5833.32 crore from BSE Cash segment.

The BSE METAL index crashed by 322.72 points to close low at 15,185.92 points, followed by REALTY index by 150.67 to 5670.23, OILS&GAS index by 57.93 to 9917.01 points, POWER index by 28.73 to 2627.73 points, FMCG index by 27.33 points to 2241.53 points, AUTO index by 18.76 to 4129.79 points and IT index by 9.76 to 4336 points.

However, BSE SML-Cap index index was up 55.82 points to 7,581.72 while HC index rose by 52.87 to 4494.02 points, BANKEX index hiked by 18.35 to 7056 points and PSU index gained by 7.25 to 6528.94 points.

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