Market rebounds on late buying, Nifty ends above 5500

Mumbai, Feb 21 (PTI) The bourses today witnessed amagnificent pull-back rally towards the end with traders andinvestors resorting to across-the-board buying as thebenchmark S&P CNX Nifty closed above the important 5,500-markon the National Stock Exchange (NSE).

The 50-share index escalated between 5,526.25 and5,413.10 before concluding at 5,518.60, a gain of 59.65points, or 1.09 per cent, over its previous close.

The market resumed on a positive note but soon felland turned choppy in the absence of any buying support asinvestors turned cautious after a steep dip in last session.

The index traded range bound for most part of the daybefore taking a sudden positive turn in the final hour on theback of low level buying in frontline counters amidst hecticshort-covering. The pull-back was led by technology, banking,FMCG, metal, infra, realty and oil & gas counters.

The market could be extremely volatile in coming daysahead of the expiry of derivatives contracts on February 24,traders said.

Wipro, TCS, JP Associates, Sterlite Industries, ONGC,Reliance Infra, ACC, Ambuja Cements, Reliance and HCL-Techwere the top gainers from the Nifty pack.

Tata Motors, Hero Honda, Maruti, NTPC, DLF, Suzlon,BPCL, Tata Power, Sesa Goa and Cipla ended with loss.

Total turnover in the cash segment fell sharply to Rs10,834 crore from Rs 14,162 crore on Friday. A total of5,154.06 lakh shares changed hands in 54,72,210 trades. Themarket capitalisation stood at Rs 63,79,594 crore.