MUMBAI, Feb 8-After a better spell,Pivotals lost the initial gains on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) today on emergence of profit taking by operators as well as domestic institutions towards the feg end.The sensex lost 32 points.The closing rates showed widespread losses.The volume of business dropped.The BSE sensitive index declined from the intra-day high of 3280.63 and dropped to close below 3200-mark at 3183.64 with a net loss of 31.71 points compared to the Friday's close of 3215.35.The BSE-100 index also dropped by 13.13 points to 1398.96 from previous close of 1412.09.Brokers said that despite buying by the foreign funds who were reportedly net buyers in some key scrips like Pfizer,Rhone Poule, E Merck, German Remedies, Digital Equipments and others,local operators pressed sales in a bid to square up their positions before end account on the National Stock Exchange (NSE).The low badla rates at the turn of the settlement have also shown operators' tendency to wind up long holdings before theforth coming Union budget.The volume of business was very low at Rs 1327.32 crore compared to last Friday's turnover of Rs 1475.10 crore.ITC clocked the highest turnover of Rs 253.68 crore followed by Pentafour Software of Rs 250.68 crore, Satyam Computer of Rs 81.93 crore, TELCO of Rs 49.29 crore and Zee Telefilms of Rs 41.50 crore.ITC firmed up by Rs 6.75 to Rs 824.25,Pentafour Software by Rs 5.75 to Rs 844.75 and Zee Telefilms by Rs 10.50 to Rs 558.50. However, Satyam Computer dipped by Rs 13.75 to Rs 846.50 and TELCO by Rs 5.90 to Rs 181.90 on selling pressure.
