Markets extend gains

The markets have moved further into the positive in the past one hour, thanks to gains in oil, PSU and metal stocks. The Sensex is quoting at 17,254, up 123 points, and the Nifty has surpassed the 5,100 mark to quote at 5,124, up 33 points.
 
Dalal Street had opened marginally in the red, but rebounded immediately in line with their Asian counterparts. Asia is largely trading in the green after the Federal Reserve raised the US growth forecasts for 2010. The US markets also ended off their lows, albeit marginally weak, after the Fed raised the GDP forecast.

The leading gainers on the Sensex are Reliance (stronger by 2% at Rs 2,220), M&M (higher by 1.8% at Rs 1,087) and Maruti (up 1.4% at Rs 1,623).

Sterlite, Tata Steel and Hero Honda have gained in the region of 1-2% each.

The top Sensex losers are Reliance Infrastructure (weaker by 0.6% at Rs 1,062), Tata Power (lower by 0.4% at Rs 1,326) and Sun Pharma (down 0.3% at Rs 1,453).

Jaiprakash, ICICI Bank and DLF are the other draggers.

The market breadth is strong. Out of 2,335 stocks traded on the BSE, there are 1,545 advancing stocks as against 722 declines.

Reliance tops the value charts on the BSE, registering a turnover of Rs 89.02 crore. This is followed by Sesa Goa at Rs 32.89 crore, ICICI Bank at Rs 32.74 crore, SBI at Rs 30.98 crore and HDIL at Rs 27.88 crore.

Suzlon tops the volume charts with trades of 2.91 million shares, followed by Unitech at 2.18 million shares, Sesa Goa at 0.87 million shares, HDIL at 0.85 million shares and Areva at 0.63 million shares.