A Directionless day ends in nominal gains

The NSE 50 and the BSE 30 indices opened minorly in negative, recovers from lower ends and closed on flattish note. Apart from Icici bank result, there were no major triggers to take them in any direction as such. The Nifty ended 2 points higher on 7849, while the Sensex was up by 3 points at 25606. The indices ended up by 0.13% and 0.10% respectively.

The advance-decline ratio ended on the negative side in the closing session. On the NSE, 1346 shares closed in green, while 1145 shares ended the day in red.

Top 5 Nifty Gainers: Zee Entertain closed with the highest gains, up by 2.4%. Kotak Mahindra, Lupin, Tata Power and Cipla were among the others trading positive.

Top 5 Nifty Losers: Idea Cellular finished the day down by 6.2%, followed by HCL Tech, Bharti Airtel, Bank of Baroda and SBI.

7 out of the 13 sectors closed in the green. Healthcare was the top gainer up by 117 points. This was followed by Bankex, up by 63 points, and Metal, which gained 40 points. Mid-Caps and Small-Caps were up by 24 points and down by 5 points respectively. However Consumer Durables and IT were down by 115 points and 50 points respectively.  

The Nikkei market was the top loser among its Asian peers, dropping 624 points. Hang Seng was down by 320 points, and Shanghai and Taiwan Weighted also remained in the red.

Buzzer: The banking major stock ICICI Bank down by 1.3 per cent. The broke vital support of Rs 240. If it continues with current movement may see more downward moves.   

The Nifty traded in a very narrow range for today’s session. Monday’s opening may decide some direction for the index.