Markets rebound into positive territory

After starting on a weak note, and trading sideways throughout the morning, the markets have come back to life in the afternoon session, aided by strength in consumer goods, metals and power stocks.

The Sensex is at 17,197, higher by 72 points and the Nifty is at 5,136, up 24 points. The Small cap and Mid-cap indices are also up.

Soaring prices of vegetables like potatoes and onions has pushed the annual rate of inflation for food articles to 19.05 per cent for the week ended November 28 as against 17.47 per cent in the previous week.

Telecom majors have moved up smartly this morning. Bharti Airtel and Reliance Communications have advanced over 2% each to Rs 340 and Rs 185. BHEL has also added more than 2% at Rs 2,291.

Steel stoks, which corrected on the previous day, also figure in the gainer's list. Tata Steel has gained 1.7% at Rs 544 and Hindalco has added 1.4% at Rs 143.

Hero Honda is the top loser on the BSE, shedding 1.2% at Rs 1,680. Sun Pharma and HDFC Bank are the other notable losers, giving up around 1% apiece.

The market breadth is strong. Out of 2,732 stocks traded on the BSE, there are 1,692 advancing stocks as against 947 declines.

Tata Steel tops the value charts on the BSE so far, clocking a turnover of Rs 60.94 crore, followed by GVK Power at Rs 51.19 crore, SBI at Rs 47.83 crore, Bharti Airtel at Rs 42.51 crore and ICICI Bank at Rs 41.07 crore.

Unitech has clocked the highest volumes of 15.72 million shares, followed by Suzlon at 14.19 million, IFCI at 11.59 million, Reliance Natural Resources 5.07 million and Bharti Airtel at 3.59 million.