Markets End In Green, Await ECB Action

Indian markets had opened their trades on a very flat note today. Around the noon, they gained some momentum and went northwards, but eventually gave up most of their gains by closing. The Nifty traded above the 5250 levels for some part of the day, but ultimately closed lower than 5240. The Sensex and Nifty closed up by 0.19% and 0.24% respectively.

Among the sectoral indices, IT zoomed up and closed higher by over 2%, helping the markets' move into the green zone. Others like Teck, Auto and Healthcare also closed in positives. On the other hand, investors' favourite defensive bet FMCG closed lower by 1.75%. Other indices that saw losses are Consumer Durables, Capital Goods and Realty.

The peer Asian markets also closed on a positive note, with major indices like Hang Seng, Shanghai and Nikkei higher in the range of 0.01%-0.70%. According to reports, Chinese stocks rose for the first time in three days on speculations that policy makers will take more steps to stimulate the economy after a government agency approved subway plans for 18 cities.

European markets also are trading higher currently, with the CAC, DAX and FTSE up in the range of 0.6%-1.21%. Market participants are speculating about some kind of positive move from Mario Draghi in the European Central Bank meet.

Dow Jones Futures is currently trading lower by 59 points or 0.45% at 13109, indicating a negative sentiment in the US markets.

Back home, most of the stocks continued similar trends as seen earlier in the day. IT stocks Wipro and Infosys ended higher by 4.7% and 3.68% respectively. Jindal Steel closed 2.77% up at Rs 345.30, while other Metals stocks like Sterlite Industries and Hindalco Industries also closed with gains of 0.64% and 0.74% respectively. Tata Power, Sun Pharma, Cipla, SBI, M&M, NTPC, ICICI Bank, etc. also ended the day's trades in the positive territory.

Capital Goods heavyweights BHEL and L&T closed lower by 3.25% and 0.53% respectively. FMCG majors ITC and HUL also saw losses of 2.54% and 0.92% respectively. Dr. Reddy’s Labs, HDFC, Bajaj Auto and RIL are some of the others closing in the red.

The shares of Tata Communications closed 1.4% higher at Rs 228. This was after the company made an announcement that it has delivered critical connectivity to Cargotec’s global IT systems. According to reports, the shares of cable operators Den Networks and Hathway Cable & Datacom have closed in gains of 6% and 7% respectively (almost at their 52-week highs) on the back of heavy volumes on the BSE.

The market breadth, which indicates the overall health of the market, remained on the positive side for the day. Out of the 3280 stocks traded on the BSE, 1596 advanced, 1500 declined and 184 were unchanged.

We expect the markets to remain volatile for tomorrow as investors across the globe would be tracking the ECB meet. We would advise our readers to play with caution.