Sensex lacklustre; metals stocks lose shine

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It is an extremely lacklustre market due to lack of global cues and absense of domestic triggers. Globally, every market is waiting for some improvement over Greece debt deal and is expected to be announced by the weekend. Even the US employment situation report will be keenly watched today. European markets were flat in early trade.

Back home, Infosys, Bharti, TCS and BHEL were helping the market while Reliance, L&T and SBI weighed down. The Sensex was down just 1.85 points at 17,430 while the Nifty rose 4.65 points to 5,274.55.

Metals stocks lost their shine today, respective index falling over a percent. Tata Steel, Jindal Steel and Sterlite Industries were down 2% each; Hindalco tanked 3.5%.

Index heavyweights Reliance Industries, SBI and L&T plummeted 1-1.5%. Tata Motors, ICICI Bank and ITC slipped 0.5-1%.

However, shares of Bharti Airtel retained its top position in the buying list, rising 2.7%. Coal India rallied 2% as the company proposed Interim Dividend of Rs 5,400 crore by March.

Infosys, TCS, HDFC, BHEL and NTPC were up 0.5-1.3%. HUL, Sun Pharma, Cipla and Tata Power gained 1-1.6%.

The broader markets continued to outperform benchmarks, rising 1%.

The Indian rupee gained 25 paise to trade at 48.88 a dollar.

At 12 hours IST : Nifty in narrow range; broader mkts outperform

The Nifty was moving in a narrow range of 5260-5280 levels since early trade, due to lack of global and domestic cues. The NSE benchmark rose 5 points to 5,275.15 and the BSE benchmark moved up just 11 points to 17,443.05. But the broader markets outpaced the benchmarks. The BSE Midcap and Smallcap indices were up 0.9%.

Shares of Sun Pharma, Coal India, M&M, Bharti Airtel, HUL, IDFC, Power Grid Corp, BHEL and Grasim were top gainers among largecaps, rising 1.5-3%.

Infosys, TCS, HDFC, HDFC Bank and Hero Motocorp rose 0.4-0.7%.

However, Hindalco, Sterlite Industries, Tata Steel, Jindal Steel, L&T and Reliance Communications were biggest losers, falling 1-3%.

Index heavyweights Reliance Industries, ICICI Bank and SBI dropped 0.8-1%.

In the second line shares, Prestige Estate, Eros International, Alok Industries, Marico and Jubilant Foodworks rallied 6-10% while Fresenius Kabi, Ipca Labs, Strides Arcolab, Ashok Leyland and Chennai Petro lost 2-4%.

The market breadth remained positive; advancing shares outumbered declining by 1431 to 1070 on the BSE.