Sensex rises 67 points
Mumbai: On Friday institutional investors went bargain hunting in late trades. The 30-share Sensex finished the day 67 points higher than its previous close. In early trades, the Sensex was down about 35 points or 210 points down since Monday's close amid profit booking by foreign institutional investors (FIIs) in the last few days and on unwinding by traders.

Dealers were quoted as saying that select mutual funds were seen buying blue-chip stocks in late trades as values turned attractive after a correction of over 4 per cent in the last four trading sessions. In an extremely volatile trading session, the Sensex finally finished the day at 4,838.54 points, up 67.31 points as against the day's low of 4,736.70 points. On the NSE, the Nifty gained 18.40 points to close at 1,540.70 points.
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Activity hogs limelight in December contracts
Mumbai: Activity picked up at futures and options segment on the NSE on Friday, ahead of the settlement week, (the near month November contracts are expiring on November 27); the F&O segment witnessed a turnover of Rs 10,957 crore as against Thursday's Rs 9,800 crore. Turnover surpassed the Rs 10,000-crore mark after a gap of 10 trading sessions (on November 6, the turnover was Rs 10,243 crore).

Cumulative FIIs' positions as percentage of total gross market position, as on Thursday was 18.61 per cent. They had bought about Rs 262 crore and sold Rs 221 crore worth contracts on Thursday.
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UTI MF revamp portfolio benefits from midcap rally
Mumbai: The stock market rally in the past six months has come to the rescue of UTI Mutual Fund (UTI MF), India's largest mutual fund. The rally has given the fund a chance to restructure its portfolio. The MF has reduced the number of companies in its portfolio by about 20-25 per cent in order to maximise the returns across a number of schemes.

A K Sridhar, UTI MF's chief investment officer, said: "We are churning our portfolio in a big way. Our average turnover (buying and selling) in October had peaked to Rs 2,000 crore compared with Rs 600-800 crore in the previous few months. The turnover has increased drastically in the mid-cap stocks, except in the Master Value Fund which is designed for investment in small and the mid-stocks."
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Rupee closes 20 paise lower
Mumbai: The rupee continued to be under pressure on Friday and fell to a new two-month low against the dollar 45.94/96 levels in intra-day deals before recovering to close at 45.75/76. With today's fall of nearly 20 paise, the rupee has lost nearly 65 paise since November 10. Opening on a distinctly weak note at 45.85/86, the rupee went lower on hectic all-round dollar demand on the back of falling foreign fund inflows. Players rushed to cover short-dollar positions in the face of dwindling dollar supplies.

On Wednesday, the rupee had shot up to 45.45/46 on exporter sales and unwinding of long-dollar positions. Since then sustained demand amidst fears of a cash-dollar shortage has seen it under pressure as importers advanced end-month covering. Sentiment on the currency was further affected due to the global terrorists attack.
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