Markets open flat ahead of RBI's policy on Tue

Bharti Airtel lead drop while Maruti gained on BSE

Indian shares opened flat with a slight negative bias on Monday on uncertainty over the Reserve Bank of India's monetary policy stance at Tuesday's review.

The Bombay Stock Exchange's Sensex index fell 26 points to open at 19,291 while the National Stock Exchange's Nifty-50 index declined 19 points and opened at  5,860.50.

Trading was on a cautious note ahead of the central bank's monetary policy review tomorrow amid fear RBI may maintain status-quo and wait until January before cutting interest rates and also on account of advance tax payout by the Indian companies on their third quarter earnings.

On the global front, US stocks fell on Friday as another slide in Apple took a toll and investors unloaded some shares because of the uncertainty surrounding the “fiscal cliff” negotiations.

The Dow Jones industrial average slipped 35.71 points, or 0.27%, to 13,135.01 at the close. The S&P’s 500 Index fell 5.87 points. The Nasdaq Composite Index lost 20.83 points at 2,971.33.

Asian markets are trading mixed amid profit-taking in certain markets after last week's gain. China's stocks, however, gained on reports government may maintain steady economic policies in 2013 while Japanese markets touched 8-1/2 month high after LDP party that backs more economic stimulus returned to power with a landslide election victory on Sunday.

China's Shanghai Composite gained 0.14% to 2,154, Hong Kong's Hang Seng was down 0.3% to 22,544, Singapore's Straits Times declined 0.2% to 3,163 while Japan's Nikkei rose 1.6% to 9,894.

The MSCI Asia Pacific index outside Japan fell 0.5% to 898.32.

Back home, capital goods, consumer durables and fast moving consumer goods indexes led fall while metal , IT, automobiles sector led gains on BSE.

Among key Sensex stocks, the laggards include Bharti Airtel falling 1%, ITC and Larsen & Toubro declined 0.6% each while among gainers Maruti Suzuki rose 2% and Hindaco, Sterlite Industries gained 1% each in metal space.

The BSE mid-cap and small-cap gained 0.2%.

The overall breadth was positive as 785 stocks gained while 385 stocks declined on the BSE.