Markets end flat, auto stocks drop

The markets ended on a flat note today, after gyrating between zones during intra-day trades. The Sensex was up 10 points at 18,528, after having recovered 161 points from the day's low of 18,367. The Nifty, on the other hand, closed almost unchanged at 5,551.The international cues were not encouraging either. The European markets opened in the negative while the Asian markets closed mixed. The rally seen on Friday was an abberation in the downtrend as the market resumed its losing streak with the Nifty trading below of the 200-DMA.

Earlier in the day, markets opened higher following firm Asian peers and positive sentiment built in after commodity prices eased last week. However investors booked profit in the morning session after the steep rally on Friday which saw the market slipping into the negative. However, after languishing in the negative territory in the early noon trades, the markets rebounded into the positive zone on the back of fresh buying in FMCG stocks and on bargain hunting in pivotals after an intra-day slide.

Adding to the downtrend, Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) continued to remain net sellers. They sold shares worth Rs 655 crore on Friday, while DIIs were net buyers of Rs 1,081crore in equities. FIIs have been net sellers of Indian equities since April 25 and have sold Rs 7032.63 crore in the past 10 trading sessions.

Hormuz Maloo, Technical Analyst, Geojit BNP Paribas Securities says, “I think the markets are quite weak. The medium term trend seems to be downtrend and the market is likely to go down much further. In the short term also, it is unlikely the market will manage to move up much. First resistance on the upside is at 5,530 and the next is at 5,550. I think within the next 3-4 days market will fall below its recent low of 5,443 and proceed further downwards.”

Among the sectoral indices, interest rate sensitive auto stocks fell on worries that a higher interest rates could crimp sales of automobiles. The index is the top loser, trading at 9,100, down 1.3%.Worries on rising interest rates which could hurt future profit saw the Bankex index remain in the negative for the major part of the day. The major losers in the banking space are Punjab National Bank, Bank of India, Axis Bank and Yes Bank down 1% each.

On the other hand, most of the FMCG  stocks rose ahead of Hindustan Unilever's Q4 result making it the top gainer among the sectoral indices which gained 1.2%. Hindustan Unilever up 3.5%, Nestle India up 3%, Marico, United Spirits and Colgate Palmolive which added 1% each were the top gainers. The metal index that added 0.7% was the other noteable gainer.

Among the top gainers on the Sensex apart from banking and FMCG stocks were Bharti Airtel up 4% followed by Tata Power, Jindal Steel, Sterlite Industries and Hindalco Industries which gained between 0.6% - 3%

The major losers were Maruti Suzuki and Jaiprakash Associates down 2% each followed by Tata Motors, Bajaj Auto, Reliance Infrastructure, Wipro and Hero Honda down 1% each.

The market breadth was negative. Of the total 2905 stocks traded onthe BSE, 1512 stocks  declined while 1284 advanced.