Mumbai: Share prices resumed sharply lower on profit selling by operators on negative advices from Wall Street but immediately recovered on fresh buying in select old-economy counters at opening session on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) on June 24.

The BSE-30 share Sensitive Index opened bearish at 3441.07 as against June 23's close of 3461.38. However, it recouped smartly on selective buying to a high of 3467.20 before being quoted at 3459.90 at 10.45 hours (IST).

Brokers attributed initial weakness in share values, particularly IT stocks, to overnight steep decline on Wall Street where the Dow Jones Industrial Average and the tech-heavy NASDAQ COMPOSITE INDEX dropped by nearly 129 and 34 points respectively.

However, renewed buying in select heavyweights helped shares recovered smartly, a dealer said.

Steel stocks attracted good buying following reports of hike in steel prices again in the next week.

Refinery major, IOC, also was in limelight on encouraging working results for the financial year 2003. The net profit of the company spurted by 138 per cent.

Among major gainers, Mascot Sys rose by 4.27 per cent, IOC by 3.42 per cent, Titan Ind by 2.83 per cent, Bata India by 2.20 per cent, Nalco by 2.12 per cent, BEML by 2.03 per cent, Saw Pipes by 2.03 per cent, Century Text by 1.82 per cent, EIL by 1.81 per cent and GNFC by 1.74 per cent.

Pentamedia, HMT, GAIL, Arvind Mill, NIIT, Wipro, Aventis Pharma, Dr Reddy, CMC Ltd and Shyam Telecom were the major losers.

PTI