Nifty closes below 5400 ahead of settlement week

The 50-share NSE Nifty closed below the 5400 level for the first time this week on Friday, weighed down by weak Asian cues after doubts over Greece's future in the Eurozone and easing of hopes of US QE3. The index fell 28.65 points to close at 5,386.70 ahead of F&O expiry week, after hitting an intraday low of 5,371.

Sudarshan Sukhani, s2analytics.com feels that if the Nifty cracks on Monday then the advisable action would be to close long positions and then even below 5350 start looking for selling.

Meanwhile, the 30-share BSE benchmark was down 67.01 points to 17,783.21 after falling as much as 125 points intraday, due to downward journey in infrastructure and banks stocks. Reliance Industries and Infosys too added fuel to the fire.

The Indian rupee too depreciated by 18 paise to 55.44 against the US dollar, at 15:31 hours IST.

Engineering and construction major Larsen & Toubro and state-owned power equipment manufacturer fell nearly 1%. Power producers NTPC and Tata Power declined 1% each.

Country's largest lenders State Bank of India and ICICI Bank slipped 1.8% and 0.92%, respectively while their rival HDFC Bank was down 0.2%.

Metals stocks dropped on profit booking; Tata Steel tanked 2.7%; Jindal Steel and Hindalco lost 2% each whereas Sterlite Industries gained 0.6%.

Reliance Industries, India's most valued stock tumbled 1.55% whereas state-run oil & gas producer ONGC rallied 2%.

Utility vehicle major Mahindra & Mahindra went down 1.2% after the management cut tractor sales forecast to 2% from 10% for FY13.

Top coal producer Coal India jumped over 2% as the company is going to consider buy back of shares in the upcoming annual general meeting that scheduled for September 18.

Cigarette major ITC and housing finance company HDFC went up 0.5% each.

Shares of Tata Motors, Maruti Suzuki and Bajaj Auto bounced back in late trade to close with 0.2-0.9% gains.

For the week, the Sensex gained 0.52% and the Nifty rose 0.4%. Foreign institutional investors have bought nearly Rs 8,500 crore (till August 23) worth of shares consistently since July 27.

In the second line shares, Suven Lifesciences and Venus Remedies, which touched 52-week high today, rose 10% and 17%, respectively.

S Kumars, Jain Irrigation, Opto Circuits, MTNL, Orchid Chemical, Aurobindo Pharma, Gujarat NRE Coke, JSW Steel and Reliance Power gained 2-7%.
 
IFCI tanked 16% as the Cabinet has approved conversion of company’s debentures held by government to equity.

Lanco Infratech, NCC, Indiabulls Real, HDIL and SKS Microfinance were down 3-5%.

The BSE Midcap Index declined 0.6% and Smallcap lost 0.8%. Decliners outnumbered advancers by 945 to 472 on the National Stock Exchange.