A close above the day's high may bring some relief in the current downtrend. Support is around 6,050 in the Nifty
 

The market finished marginally down on selling pressure from capital goods, realty and oil & gas sectors, making the third consecutive close in the negative. A close above the day's high may bring some relief in the current downtrend. Support is around 6,050 in the Nifty. The National Stock Exchange (NSE) reported a volume of 56.33 crore shares and advance-decline ratio of 451:956.

The market opened in the positive tracking its Asian peers which were firm in morning trade on reports that the Bank of Japan will implement a bond-buying programme to help achieve a 2% inflation target. US indices closed at new highs overnight as comments from some Federal Reserve officials allayed fears of the closure of the central bank’s bond buying initiative.

The Nifty opened 13 points higher at 6,127 and the Sensex resumed trade at 20,151, a gain of 39 points over its previous close. Buying in IT, banking and metal stocks enabled the indices hit their day’s high in the first half hour itself. The Nifty touched 6,148 and the Sensex rose to 20,220 at their respective highs.

Profit booking amid choppy trade resulted in the benchmarks paring part of their early gains and head lower in subsequent trade. The indices were range-bound in the remaining part of the morning session.

The benchmarks entered the negative zone at around 2.00pm on selling pressure from capital goods, realty and oil &gas sectors. Negative opening of the key European markets ahead of US Fed chairman Ben Bernanke’s comments on the outlook for the US economy also weighed on domestic investors. The decline led the market to its low in post-noon trade. At this point the Nifty fell to 6,074 and the Sensex retracted back to 20,001.

Meanwhile Infrastructure conglomerate Larsen & Toubro today reported 6.90% decline in standalone net profit at Rs1,787.94 crore for the fourth quarter ended March, 2013, due to a sharp rise in interest outgo. The company had reported a net profit of Rs 1,920.41 crore for the corresponding quarter of 2011-12. Net sales of the company were up nearly 10% at Rs 20,293.83 crore during the quarter vis-a-vis Rs 18,460.90 crore of the Q4 of FY12.

The market managed to pull itself from the lows and close with a minor loss, but was down for the third straight day. The Nifty fell 20 points (0.32%) to 6,095 and the Sensex closed the session at 20,062, down 49 points (0.25%).

The broader indices underperformed the Sensex today, as the BSE Mid-cap index declined 0.83% and the BSE Small-cap index dropped 0.82%.

The sectoral gainers were BSE Fast Moving Consumer Goods (up 0.83%); BSE Healthcare (up 0.41%); BSE TECk (up 0.22%) and BSE IT (up 0.13%). The main losers were BSE Capital Goods (down 3.67%); BSE Realty (down 3.47%); BSE Oil & Gas (down 0.98%); BSE Power (down 0.69%) and BSE Metal (down 0.57%).

Out of the 30 stocks on the Sensex, 14 settled higher. The key gainers were Sun Pharmaceutical Industries (up 2.90%); Bharti Airtel (up 2.25%); Dr Reddy’s Laboratories (up 1.84%); NTPC (up 1.48%) and ITC (up 1.28%). The key losers were Larsen & Toubro (down 5.57%); Tata Power (down 2.16%); Hero MotoCorp (down 2.04%); GAIL India (down 1.34%) and Sterlite Industries (down 1.25%).

The top two A Group gainers on the BSE were—Berger Paints (up .34%) and Castrol India (up 3.80%).

The top two A Group losers on the BSE were—Adani Power (down 7.01%) and DLF (down 5.63%).

The top two B Group gainers on the BSE were—Kaveri Telecom Products (up .90%) and Best & Crompton (up 19.84%).

The top two B Group losers on the BSE were—Krypton Industries (down 18.82%) and Filatex Fashions (down 18.51%).

Of the 50 stocks on the Nifty, 20 ended in the in the green. The main gainers were Sun Pharma (up 2.88%); Bharti Airtel (up 2.48%); NTPC (up 1.97%); Dr Reddy’s (up 1.68%) and ITC (up 1.62%). The major losers were L&T (down 6.05%); DLF (down 5.92%); Jaiprakash Associates (down 4.23%); BPCL (down 3.32%) and Bank of Baroda (down 3.28%).

The Asian pack, with the exception of the Shanghai Composite and the Hang Seng, closed higher after the Bank of Japan asserted that it would continue to support the economy. The Chinese bench settled lower as the government proposed a ban on coal imports while the Hong Kong market was down as a storm shut the financial markets earlier this morning.

The Jakarta Composite gained 0.37%; the KLSE Composite rose 0.38%; the Nikkei 225 surged 1.60%; the Straits Times advanced 0.30%; the Seoul Composite climbed 0.64% and the Taiwan Weighted settled 0.19% higher. Among the losers, the Shanghai Composite lost 0.12% and the Hang Seng declined 0.45%.

At the time of writing, the main European indices were down between 0.11% and 0.19% while the US stock futures were marginally higher.  

Back home, foreign institutional investors were net buyers of stocks totalling Rs679.44 crore on Monday while domestic institutional investors were net sellers of equities amounting to Rs866.69 crore.

FMCG major Emami has received two international awards for packaging from Worldstar 2013. The awards saw participation from 33 countries with 316 entries at the Auspack PLUS 2013 in Sydney, Australia. The two awards received were for Himani Navratna Cool Talc in the health and beauty Category and Menthoplus Balmin the Pharmaceutical & Medical category. The stock surged 3.33% to close at Rs753.10 on the NSE.

JSW Ispat Steel’s board on 21^st May has approved the company’s plan to buy Heidelberg Cement’s grinding unit in Maharashtra, at Dolvi in Raigad district of Maharashtra, adjacent to the company’s steel plant, for an unnamed sum. The acquisition is proposed by way of a ‘slump sale’ and would be subject to obtaining necessary approvals and completion of due diligence. JSW Ispat Steel declined 2.14% to close at Rs9.15 on the NSE.

Tata Teleservices has entered into a partnership with GMR Airports to offer Wi-Fi services at Delhi and the Hyderabad international airports. The agreement would enable passengers transiting through the Indira Gandhi International Airport Terminal 3 in Delhi and Rajiv Gandhi Hyderabad International Airport, Hyderabad, access free Wi-Fi services for a specified time. The stock dropped 8.91% to close at Rs9.20 on the NSE.