Mumbai: Responding positively to the decision to okay margins trading by the Securities and Exchange Board of India (SEBI), the Sensex rallied smartly and rose past 6000-mark during morning trading at the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) today (Jan 8, 2004).

Bulls that had slowed earlier in the week, once again began building up positions after SEBI decided to permit brokers to finance clients through margin trading, market sources said adding the move might ignite a fresh bull run in the market.

The BSE Benchmark 30-share Index opened strong at 5992.10 as against yesterday's close of 5957.02 and later spurted past 6000-level to a high at 6055.02 before being quoted at 6049.52 at 10.30 a.m.

Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs), which remained net buyers in the first two sessions despite heavy sell-off by domestic investors, also are expected to continue their purchases ahead of quarterly corporate results to be announced by key companies shortly.

Heavyweights like RIL, Grasim, GACL, BHEL, L&T, HLL, HPCL, Infosys Tech, ITC, Tata Motors, SBI and Satyam Computer were quoted sharply up.

Among the top gainers, Escorts were quoted up by 6.60 per cent, MIRC by 6.13 per cent, Crompton Gr by 5.98 per cent, Vijaya Bank by 5.83 per cent, Raymond by 5.19 per cent, Nat Fert by 5.13 per cent, Nirma by 5.11 per cent, Punjab National Bank by 4.90 per cent and IOC by 4.83 per cent.