IT shares firmed up

After being under pressure for the last few sessions, shares from the IT sector rose on renewed buying. Arresting a three-day strong rally, the rupee on Thursday fell back about 36 paise, to 43.40/43 levels, in late-morning trade on buying of dollars by banks, probably on behalf of the Reserve Bank of India (RBI). In active trade at the Interbank Foreign Exchange (forex) market, the Indian unit resumed weak at 43.30/32 per dollar from Wednesday's close of 43.04/05 a dollar and later tumbled to a low of 43.40/43 per dollar during late-morning deals.

The rupee had climbed to its highest levels in more than seven years following a strong 69 paise surge in the last three sessions due to heavy dollar sales by banks, which were facing acute liquidity crunch.

Satyam Computer gained 1.85% to Rs 464. The company said on Wednesday, it had entered into a five-year contract with Applied Materials, whereby it will provide application development, maintenance, and support plus business transformation core technology services to Applied Materials through a managed services delivery model.

Satyam Computer informed of having created a dedicated development center for Applied Materials. The facility would be part of Satyam's Electronic City campus at Bangalore. As per media reports, the deal with Applied Materials is estimated at about $200 million.

Among other IT stocks, TCS (up 3% to Rs 1237) and Wipro (up 1.20% to Rs 564.50) had also spurted.