Sensex recovers 188 pts in opening trade

The Bombay Stock Exchange benchmark Sens*x bounced back to quote over 188 points higher in opening trade on Wednesday, after Tuesday's fall, on fresh capital inflows by foreign funds, tracking firming trends in the global markets amid better-than-expected corporate results.

Short-covering by speculators too supported the rise in stock prices.

The 30-share index, which had lost 0.85 per cent in the previous session, recovered by 188.84 points, or 1.23 per cent to 15,251.33 points in opening trade as the sectoral indices traded in positive zone with gains of up to 3.88 per cent.

Similarly, the wide-based National Stock Exchange index Nifty moved up by 54.80 points, or 1.17 per cent to 4,523.90.

Stock brokers said pick up in buying by foreign funds, triggered by firming global equity markets on growing optimism about a recovery in the economy and better-than-expected results by some blue-chip companies.

Wipro, the software major, reported 11.86 per cent increase in consolidated net profit at Rs 1,015.50 crore on Wednesday for the first quarter ended 30th June, 2009.

The shares of the IT company were up by early 3 per cent at Rs 470.10 on the BSE.

Other gainers were Reliance Industries by 0.63 per cent to Rs 2,030.30, Reliance Infra by 2.73 per cent to Rs 1,160, Rcom by 1.55 per cent to Rs 271.80, ONG Corp by 2.98 per cent to Rs 1,075.90, Infosys Technologies by 0.96 per cent to Rs 1,961.70, Tata Steel by 1.49 per cent to Rs 417.90,Sterlite Industries by 2.04 per cent to Rs 608 and Tata Motors by 3.47 per cent to Rs 338.50.

The US Dow Jones Industrial Average ended 0.77 per cent higher on Tuesday, while Hong Kong's Hang Seng was up 0.30 per cent and Japan's Nikkei gained 1.02 per cent in morning trade on Wednesday.