Stock market ends 22 pts up after cautious two-way movements

Mumbai, Jan 17 (PTI) In a cautious two-way movement, theBSE benchmark Sensex ended flat today but managed to snap itstwo-session falling trend with 22 point gain, as domesticfunds bought scrips despite weak global trends.

In a scrip-specific activity, the total market breadthwas negative due to sell-off in second line stocks by waryretail investors on concerns over possible hike in key policyrates by RBI at its quarterly policy review meeting slated onJanuary 25.

The Bombay Stock Exchange 30-share barometer continued toveer in and out of positive terrain in a range of 19,018.94and 18,779.38 before concluding the day at 18,882.25, a mererise of 21.81 points or 0.12 per cent.

IT as well as some of the financial stocks helped theSensex end the day on a positive note.

Sensex-based software bellwethers TCS, Infosys Tech andWipro ended up by 2.06 per cent, 1.74 per cent and 0.67 percent respectively. Among the financial stocks, largest housingloan provider HDFC firmed up by 3.15 per cent, followed byHDFC Bank, 1.09 per cent and SBI, up 0.57 pct.

The shares of Anil Ambani group companies, Reliance Infraand Reliance Power, with whom RNRL has now merged, tumbled7.84 per cent and 6.13 per cent respectively after the marketregulator Sebi late last Friday passed a consent order withregard to its probe into possible violation of regulations bythe Rel Infra and RNRL. .