Markets Surge, HUL Cheers

The Indian markets saw a good spike in the last hour of trade after FMGC sector major HUL announced outstanding quarterly results, which provided some momentum. At the end of the day, the Nifty was up by 32 points at 5904 and Sensex closed 81 points up at 19,368. Both indices closed up in the range of 0.46%-0.56%.

The market breadth closed in the positive zone. On the NSE, 732 shares have advanced and 569 shares have declined.

Top 5 NSE Gainers: Hindustan Unilever emerged as the top gainer for the day on the NSE, up by 7.17%. IndusInd Bank, Reliance Infrastructure, Hero MotoCorp and Jaiprakash Associates also saw gains.

Top 5 NSE Losers: Jindal Steel and Power closed 4% down, followed by NMDC, Coal India Sun Pharma, and Ambuja Cements.

11 out of the 13 sectoral indices ended in the positive zone. FMGC and Consumer Durables surged more than 2% in today’s trade. Only Metal and Healthcare ended lower.

In the Asian markets, Straits Times inched up by 0.39%, followed by Hang Seng and Taiwan Weighted. Kospi continued to remain down, closing 0.20% lower.

The European markets are trading in the positives. CAC 40 has gained 0.66% so far and DAX is up by 0.32%. FTSE is trading flat with a negative bias.

Buzzers: Hindustan Unilever zoomed up 7% to Rs 497 after reporting a better-than-expected 18% YoY jump in standalone net profits at Rs 787 crore for the quarter ended March 2013 following strong volumes growth.

IndusInd Bank surged more than 4% and hit a record high on the back of heavy volumes on the NSE. The stock opened at Rs 457.50 and registered a high of Rs 484.20 in today’s trading session.

As we expected, the Nifty took support around the 5870 level and moved higher by 20-30 points from the support level.