Nifty rangebound; FMCG, auto, metal, cap goods dip

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Sensex lacklustre; HUL, L&T, ONGC, SBI, Hero Honda dip

At 10:34 hours IST, the Sensex continued to see lacklustre trade on the back of lack of global cues. Shares of technology and pharma companies were seeing buying interest. SAIL, Bharti Airtel, NTPC, Reliance Industries, Axis Bank, ICICI Bank, Tata Power, Suzlon and Grasim were also quite supportive.

However, HUL was the top loser, down 2.6%. P&G is going to slash Tide prices by 20%, so HUL is likely to retaliate with pricing for Rin, reports CNBC-TV18 quoting sources.

Selling was also seen in metal, auto, FMCG and select oil & gas companies' shares. SBI, L&T, HDFC, HDFC Bank, ACC, Jaiprakash Associates and PNB were the other losers in trade.

The Sensex was trading at 17083, down 14.7 points and the Nifty was at 5111, down 4 points. Asian markets were also marginally in the red barring Nikkei.

The market breadth was mixed; about 1350 shares advanced while 1493 shares declined on the BSE. Nearly 343 shares were unchanged.

Today's new listing - Man Infraconstruction was trading at Rs 363.75, up 44.35% over its issue price of Rs 252.

In the midcap space, Gammon Infra, Thermax, Bombay Rayon, LIC Housing Finance and CMC were up 3.7-5.5% while Sterlite Tech, KS Oils, Bharat Forge, National Fertiliser and Balrampur Chini fell 2-3.8%.

In the smallcap space, Century Plyboard rose 11.68%. Elantas Beck, Simplex Project, Kalyani Steels and Amara Raja Batteries gained 6-7.8% while Man Industries, Nitin Fire Protection, Gee Kay Finance, Prraneta Ind and OCL Iron lost 5-6%.

Nifty quiet in early trade; tech, pharma, power gain

The benchmark Nifty started the day on a quiet note due to lack of global cues. This consolidation phase has been continued post budget rally. Technology, pharma and power stocks along with Reliance and ICICI Bank were seeing buying interest while FMCG and metal stocks lost ground.

At 9:02 hours IST, the Nifty was trading at 5114, down 1.5 points while the Sensex was at 17100, up 2 points. 

The CNX Midcap went up 5 points to 7528; about 399 shares advanced while 272 shares declined on the NSE. 

Among the frontliners, HUL lost 1.5%. P&G is going to slash Tide prices by 20%, so HUL is likely to retaliate with pricing for Rin, reports CNBC-TV18 quoting sources.

Tata Steel fell 0.9%, as there were reports that the company hit by Orissa Govt blanket ban on iron ore mining.

HDFC, Jaiprakash Associates, HCL Tech, ACC, Hero Honda and ITC were losers. However, Ranbaxy Labs, Sulzon Energy, Wipro, Reliance Capital, SAIL, Bharti, TCS and Grasim were gainers.

Man Infraconstruction has seen terrific listing; it was trading at Rs 370, up 46.7% over its issue price of Rs 252 per share.  

Midcap & Smallcap space:

Texmo Pipes shot up 4% on second day on the exchanges. It had surged 54% on Wednesday.

GVK Power and Gammon Infra were up 1.5% each.

Triveni Engg gained 0.5% while Bajaj Hindusthan, Balrampur Chini and Dhampur Sugar declined over 3% each.

NMDC lost 3.6%; its follow-on public offer opened for subscription and its price band is at Rs 300-350 per share.

Global cues:

Asian markets were trading mixed. Nikkei rose 0.9%, as Japan's GDP rose at an annual 3.8% in Q4, slower than preliminary estimate of 4.6%. However, Shanghai and Hang Seng were down 0.33% each. Jakarta, Straits Times, Kospi and Taiwan were flat with negative bias.

The US markets ended flat in absence of any economic data. The Nasdaq hit fresh 52-week high and ended 18 points higher at 2359.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended up 3 points at 10567 and S&P 500 index was up 5 points at 1145.6.

Commodities

Reuters CRB Commodity Index was down 0.6% at 274.6.

Gold was down 1.3% at USD 1108.2/ounce.

Oil rose 0.7% at USD 82.09/bbl, after seeing USD 83 during the day on back of smaller-than-expected inventory build of 1.43 billion barrels.

Baltic Dry Index rose 0.6%.

Market cues:

FIIs were net buyers of USD 388.7 million in equities on March 9.

NSE F&O Open Interest was up by Rs 3498 crore at Rs 1,14,839 crore.

As per provisional data of March 10, FIIs were net buyers of Rs 364 crore, while DIIs were net sellers of Rs 375 crore in cash markets. FIIs were net buyers of Rs 155 crore in F&O.

F&O cues:

-Futures Open Int up Rs 670 crore
-Options Open Int up Rs 2828 crore
-Nifty Mar Fut add 1.5 lakh shares in Open Int, at 2-pt prem
-Nifty Apr Fut add 4 lakh shares in Open Int, at 1-pt prem
-Nifty Open Int PCR at 1.39 versus 1.35
-Nifty Puts add 38 lakh shares in Open Int
-Nifty Calls add 12 lakh shares in Open Int
-Nifty 5000 Put adds 13 lakh shares in Open Int
-Nifty 5100 Put adds 8.2 lakh shares in Open Int
-Nifty 5100 Call adds 3 lakh shares in Open Int
-Nifty 5300 Call adds 3 lakh shares in Open Int
-Stock Futures add 1.8 crore shares in Open Int