Nifty rangebound; oil & gas, FMCG up

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Indian benchmark indices were continued to trading in rangebound. Buying was seen oil & gas and FMCG stocks while selling pressure was seen in realty, capital goods and power stocks. Broader indices were also trading quiet.

Domestic market has witnessed much volatility in the past few weeks due to various factors like macroeconomic issues, earnings downgrades and interest rate hikes. Analysts on the street feel that the market has got derated and unless concerns over macroeconomic issues simmer down, the market won't be able to enjoy a strong rally.

Mehraboon Irani, principal and head of private client group business at Nirmal Bang Securities, said that the market has lost its feet and till the time inflationary pressure comes down, the market will have to endure pain.

"While it is nice to say that post June or post September we could possibly be looking at lower inflation and Indian markets will start moving up, but for the time being we will have to endure this pain.The pain is lack of interest, the pain is skepticism, which is now coming to the fore and people are just getting controlled more and more by the fear factor," said Irani.

At 12.03 hrs IST, the Sensex was up 32.07 points or 0.18% at 18118.27, and the Nifty was up 9.60 points or 0.18% at 5430.20.

The market breadth was negative; about 1062 shares advanced, 1377 shares declined, and 1202 shares remained unchanged.

Top gainers on the Sensex were TCS at Rs 1,166.95 up 1.33%, M&M at Rs 677.20 up 1.18%, Reliance at Rs 912.40 up 1.18%, ITC at Rs 190.90 up 1.03% and Bajaj Auto at Rs 1,296.90 up 0.80%.

Top losers on the Sensex were Reliance Comm at Rs 84.20 down 2.21%, Hero Honda at Rs 1,798.10 down 2.09%, DLF at Rs 225.20 down 2%, Tata Power at Rs 1,225 down 1.98% and Reliance Infra at Rs 553.75 down 1.3%.
Most active shares on NSE were SBI, Coal India, L&T, Reliance and Infosys.

Cigarette major ITC was trading at Rs 190.90 up 1.03% from its previous close of Rs 188.95.

Refinery major HPCL was trading at Rs 360.55 up 0.74% from its previous close of Rs 357.90.

Top gainers on the BSE Midcap - STC India, Pantaloon Ret, Kansai Nerolac, KGN Industries and HT Media were up 2-8%.

Cairn, Vedanta has agreed to extend date of closing deal to secure nod from Government of India (GoI). Cairn Energy yet to disclose new deadline for the closing deal.  Cairn India was trading at Rs 339.45, up Rs 0.10, or 0.03%.