Markets stage a recovery led by ITC

Markets reversed early losses to trade marginally up in late morning trades led by gains in FMCG major ITC and software major TCS.

The Sensex was up 53 points at 16,599 and the Nifty was up 10 points at 5,010. Earlier, the Sensex had dropped to an intra-day low of 16,436 and the Nifty at 4,960 so far.

Asian markets are trading with all the major benchmarks such as Nikkei, Hang Seng and Shanghai Composite down over 1% each because of uncertainty in Europe especially the political situation in Greece.

Among the sectoral indices on the FMCG Index was the top gainer up 2.3% followed by Capital Goods Index up 1.4%. Further, Realty, Oil & Gas indices were down over 1% each.

Among Sensex shares ITC was the top gainer up 4% at Rs 237 after Citigroup raises target price of the stock to Rs 255 from Rs 232 and reiterates its "buy" rating, calling it its "preferred pick" in the Indian consumer universe.

Software major TCS was up 2.6% at Rs 1,237 on bargain hunting at lower levels after the stock witnessed profit selling in the past few session following the weak outlook by Nasdaq-listed Cognizant Technologies Solutions.

Capital goods shares which witnessed heavy selling over the past few weeks also witnessed buying at lower levels. Both L&T and BHEL were up nearly 2% each.

Reliance Industries was the top Sensex loser down 1.7% and continued to trade below Rs 700 level after the company in its annual report said that it has cut estimates for proven gas reserves in its Krishna-Godavari (KG) block off the east coast by 6.7%, to 3.67 trillion cubic ft (tcf).

“Ambani said production from the KG-D6 block had been adversely impacted, mainly due to unforeseen reservoir complexities and water ingress in the producing fields,” the report suggests.

Other Sensex losers include, ICICI Bank, Bharti Airtel and ONGC.

Among other shares, Emami has rallied 4% to Rs 457 on reporting a 33% year-on-year growth in net profit at Rs 72 crore for the fourth quarter ended March 2012, on back of strong sales growth in various brands including Navratna Oil and Zandu Balm. Net sales of the fast moving consumer goods, grew 33% at Rs 72 crore on y-o-y basis.

The broader markets were trading flat with the Mid-cap index up 0.01% and the Small-cap index down 0.2%.
However, market breadth was negative with 1,161 losers and 1,052 gainers on the BSE.