Mumbai: The SENSEX gained by another 1.49 per cent in the seventh consecutive weekly rise at the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) that witnessed a strong rally in new economy shares as also an unprecedented investors' response to listing of Maruti Udyog Ltd (MUL) in the week under review.

The BSE Benchmark 30-share Index that rose past 3700-mark during the trading on July 11, later ended the week higher by 53.92 points at 70-week high at 3676.26 over last weekend's close of 3622.34.

The consistent recovery in bourses is more or less, a reflection of investors' response to increasing signals of a reviving Indian economy that has resulted in fetching huge foreign investments in the country over the past few months.

Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) that have made net investments over Rs 6,000 crore till June-end, remained net buyers till date with net purchases of Rs 1171 crore in eight sessions between July 1 and 10.

The SENSEX derived strength this week from a strong rally in tech sector under the leadership of IT bellwether Infosys Technologies which beat market expectations and announced a robust 28.25 per cent rise in net profits at Rs 278.12 crore and a 41.51 per cent revenue growth at Rs 1,081.98 crore in the first quarter of 2003-04. Infosys Tech also revised upwards its guidance for revenue and earnings per share (EPS) for the current fiscal.

The feature of the week was that of the keenly-watched MUL listing that created history of sorts, trading with a high premium and topping the volume list on the BSE and the National Stock Exchange (NSE) on July 9.

PTI