Markets ruled firm on FII buying last week; Sensex up 122 pts

The Sensex advanced in three out of the five trading sessions boosted by market regulator Sebi's decision to allow physical settlement of stock derivatives.
India's largest realty firm by market capitalisation, DLF, was the biggest Sensex gainer. DLF stocks rose 8.10 per cent to Rs 319.65. Realty shares were in demand on speculation that the government will soon announce a hike in foreign direct investment (FDI) in the real estate sector.

India's largest truck maker by sales, Tata Motors, was the second biggest Sensex gainer. The stock rose 7.92 per cent to Rs 831.6 after its global vehicles sales shot up 46 per cent to 91,608 units in June 2010 over the same month last year.
TCS reported a better-than-expected 24.25 per cent rise in net profit in June quarter.
The 50-issue Nifty of the National Stock Exchange (NSE) crossed the 5,400-mark after 29 months, while the 30-share Sensex scaled the 18,000-level during the week for the first time in three months.

The gains were somewhat pared by a less-than-expected industrial production data for May 2010.

The NSE Nifty ended at 5,393.90 points after touching a high of 5,453.45, a level not seen since February 6, 2008, when it had hit the 5,470.40 level. It had ended at 5,483.90 on February 5, 2008.
The BSE barometer ended higher by 122.28 points, or 0.69 per cent, to 17,955.82 from its last weekend's close.

Among the major indices, the BSE-Realty shot up by 197.17 points, or 6.04 per cent, BSE-CD by 195.24 points, or 3.91 per cent, the Bankex by 335.05 points, or 3.03 per cent, and the BSE-CG gained 357.69 points, or 2.44 per cent.
Small-cap and Mid-cap indices rose 172.83 and 80.63 points, or 1.86 per cent and 1.10 per cent, respectively.

Among other gainers ICICI Bank gained 3.54 per cent, State Bank of India 3.05 per cent, Jaiprakash Associates 3.98 per cent, L&T 2.84 per cent and Tata Steel was up 2.68 per cent.

However, M&M dropped 5.38 per cent, RCom 3.18 per cent, Infosys 3.26 per cent, Maruti 3.06 per cent, Bharti Airtel 3.05 per cent, ONGC 2.99 per cent and ACC 2.86 per cent.
Increased buying by foreign funds over the past few days and revival of monsoon also helped the market sentiment.
Turnover at the BSE and NSE rose to Rs 21,824.66 crore and Rs 68,364.07 crore respectively from last weekend's level of Rs 18,640.33 crore and Rs 53,528.24 crore.