Nifty may move sideways in the range of 5,100 and 5,215 with a downward bias

Gains in banking and realty stocks, supported by positive cues from the global arena, helped the market settle higher today. As we had mentioned yesterday that the downtrend has begun, we continue to maintain the same outlook. The Nifty may now see a sideways move in the range of 5,100 and 5,215 with a downward bias. The National Stock Exchange (NSE) traded with a volume of 75.40 crore shares today.

The domestic market opened higher, tracking gains in the Asian region in morning trade following reports that European leaders on Monday supported plans for greater fiscal integration in Europe. The Nifty started trade at 5,125, up 38 points and the Sensex gained 103 points at 16,966. The opening figure of the Sensex was its intraday low while the Nifty fell a tad lower to 5,120 at its low.

The indices were sideways for most part of the morning trade. A pick-up in buying activity in subsequent trade saw the market inching marginally higher in the noon session. Spurred by State Bank of India’s announcement that the government would infuse funds amounting to around Rs7,900 crore into the state-owned lender and ICICI Bank’s better-than-expected third quarter results, the banking sector was the top gainer today.

A positive opening of the key European markets kept the momentum steady in post-noon trade. The benchmarks hit their intraday highs towards the end of the session with the Nifty scaling 5,215 and the Sensex touching 17,239.

The market closed marginally off the highs of the day. The Nifty gained 112 points at 5,199 and the Sensex jumped 330 points to settle at 17,194.

The advance-decline ratio on the NSE was 1201:579.

Among the broader indices, the BSE Mid-cap index surged 1.99% and the BSE Small-cap index climbed 1.41%.

The BSE Bankex index (up 3.84%) was the top sectoral today. It was followed by BSE Realty (up 3.51%); BSE Auto (up 2.37%); BSE Metal (up 2.24%) and BSE TECk (up 1.85%). There were no red ticks in the sectoral space today.

Hindalco Industries (up 6.65%); ICICI Bank (up 5.87%); DLF (up 5.29%); Tata Motors (up 4.06%) and Bajaj Auto (up 3.58%) were the top performers on the Sensex. The losers were led by Coal India (down 2.99%); Maruti Suzuki (down 1.10%); Hindustan Unilever (down 0.76%); NTPC (down 0.09%) and ONGC (down 0.05%).

The top performers on the Nifty were Hindalco Ind (up 8.07%); Reliance Communications (up 7.31%); Sesa Goa (up 7.12%); IDFC (up 6.39%) and Axis Bank (up 6.02%). Coal India (down 2.31%); Siemens (down 1.86%); Punjab National Bank (down 1.19%); Cairn India (down 1.08%) and Maruti Suzuki (down 0.98%) settled at the bottom of the index.

Markets in Asia closed higher on hopes of a pact would be reached that would enable Greece avoiding a debt default. Besides, a 4% surge in Japanese factory output in December also supported the gains.

The Shanghai Composite rose 0.33%; the Hang Seng surged 1.14%; the Jakarta Composite gained 0.68%; the KLSE Composite climbed 0.51%; the Nikkei 225 added 0.11%; the Straits Times advanced 0.64%; the Seoul Composite was up 0.79% and the Taiwan Weighted closed 1.48% higher. At the time of writing, the key European markets were trading with gains in the range of 0.69% to 1.24% and the US stocks futures were in the green.

Back home, foreign institutional investors were net sellers of equities totalling Rs201.71 crore on Monday and domestic institutional investors were net sellers of stocks amounting to Rs533.69 crore.

Tiles maker Somany Ceramics on Tuesday said it has entered into an agreement with Italy’s Fiandre Group for marketing and distribution of the latter’s Active range of tiles in India. Under the agreement, Somany will start selling the premium tiles which are priced at Rs350-Rs450 per sq ft at its stores in all major cities. The stock jumped 5.17% to settle at Rs38.65 on the NSE.

Wind turbine maker Suzlon has bagged an over Rs 600-crore contract from CLP India, the Indian subsidiary of Hong Kong-based power company CLP, for setting up a 100-MW project in Rajasthan. The project, which comprises 48 wind turbines, is scheduled to be commissioned by January 2013. Suzlon settled 6.45% higher at Rs28.05 on the NSE today.

Starbucks Corp, the world's largest coffee shop company, will open its first cafe in India in August through an equal joint venture with Tata Global Beverages. The venture, Tata Starbucks, will spend Rs400 crore initially and open 50 Starbucks cafe across the country by the end of the calendar year. Tata Global Beverages soared 10.52% to Rs108.20 on the NSE today.