Mid-day Mood | IT, realty drive Sensex, Nifty into green, midcaps, smallcaps rebound

Indices recover from losses made in early trade

The Sensex and Nifty rebounded from the red around noon on March 14 and traded 0.3 percent in the green, driven by IT and construction stocks.

Infosys and L&T were the major contributors to the gains seen in the Nifty 50 index. The market took a breather after tumbling in the previous session on worries about the results of a stress test on certain mutual funds schemes.

The benchmarks had opened on a negative note amid mixed global cues on March 14. Around noon, the Sensex was up 194.96 points or 0.27 percent at 72,956.85, and the Nifty 50 was up 84.20 points or 0.38 percent at 22,081.90. About 2,447 shares advanced, 824 declined, and 77 remained unchanged.

The BSE MidCap and BSE SmallCap indices were up by 1.4 percent and 2.5 percent after being beaten down on March 13 by nearly 5 percent each.

Barring Nifty Realty, all sectoral indices were in the green around mid-day. Nifty Media and Nifty Metal were the top gainers as they rose over 2 percent and 1.2 percent.

There is room for the broader market to correct more since the valuations continue to be elevated, said VK Vijayakumar, chief investment strategist at Geojit Financial Services. He said that investors should now focus on largecaps and quality midcaps. The turbulence in the market will give opportunities to investors to cherry-pick stocks, he said.

"From now on, irrational exuberance will take a backseat and rational valuations and quality will be the driving force," Vijayakumar said. High quality private sector banks and leading names in capital goods, telecom, and autos can be accumulated in a calibrated manner, he suggested.

The Nifty 50 may find support at 21,850, followed by 21,800 and 21,700, said Deven Mehata, research analyst at Choice Broking. On the higher side, 22,050 can be an immediate resistance, followed by 22,150 and 22,200.

Adani Enterprises, Adani Ports, Hindalco, Hero MotoCorp, Infosys

JSW Steel, Dr Reddy's Laboratories, Tata Steel, Axis Bank, HDFC Bank

Infosys, L&T, M&M, HCL Tech, Bharti Airtel

JSW Steel, Tata Steel, Axis Bank, HDFC Bank, Bajaj Finance

SJVN: Shares surged around 8 percent a day after the company's renewable arm SJVN Green Energy Limited (SGEL) received the Letter of Intent (LOI) from Gujarat Urja Vikas Nigam Limited (GUVNL) for 500 MW Solar Project.

One97 Communications (Paytm): Shares extended losses falling over 3 percent ahead of the March 15 deadline for Paytm Payments Bank services. The decline comes a day after the country's largest lender State Bank of India partnered with Paytm for its consumer UPI payments.