Markets remain volatile in a narrow range, IT gains

Benchmark indices continue to remain flat with Indices making swings between negative and positive zone.

At 14:30 PM, the Sensex was up 31 points at 20,528 and the Nifty was trading at 6,089 mark up 16 points.

Adds Chetan Jain, Deputy Manager (Derivatives Desk) - Equity Research, Anand Rathi, “Nifty on expiry basis has seen decrease in price by around 3.8% along with fall in OI by 15% and better rollover of 72% vs 68% in previous month suggesting most of the shorts have not carried over their positions to the Feb series.”

On the global front, Asian stocks slipped on Friday, as fears about the impact of the Federal Reserve's stimulus withdrawal on emerging markets offset the reassurance of upbeat U.S. growth data.

With several countries, including Hong Kong and Singapore, observing the Lunar New Year holiday, volume across the region was expected to be lighter than usual.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan . Japan's Nikkei stock average reversed sharply, shedding 0.9 percent as a resurgent yen took a toll on exporter shares.

Back home, the rupee appreciated due to dollar sale by banks. Bullish equities also helped the rupee. At 14:20 pm, the rupee was trading at Rs 62.50 compared with previous close of Rs 62.58 per dollar.

Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) sold shares worth a net Rs 430.20 crore on Thursday, as per provisional data from the stock exchanges.

On the sectoral front, BSE Realty, Metal, IT, Power and Oil & Gas indices have gained by 1% each. However, BSE Consumer Durables and Auto indices have declined by nearly 1%.

IT stocks are in demand on good US economic data. TCS, Wipro and Infosys have gained between 0.4-2%.

Bank stocks have gained after the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) laid out a road map to deal with a surge in bad loans in the banking system. SBI, Axis Bank and ICICI Bank have gained between 0.2- 1%.

Other notable gainers are M&M, Tata Steel, Tata Power, GAIL, Sesa Sterlite and Bharti Airtel.

On the losing side, Tata Motors, HDFC, NTPC, Hero Moto and Bajaj Auto have declined between 1-3%.

Among other shares, Adani Enterprises has lost 3.75% to Rs 231.15 after consolidated net profit declined 83.61% to Rs 68.20 crore on 0.71% growth in total income to Rs 13747 crore in Q3 December 2013 over Q3 December 2012.

Union Bank of India has gained 1.98% to Rs 105.80 after net profit rose 15.39% to Rs 348.94 crore on 18.26% increase in total income to Rs 8230.17 crore in Q3 December 2013 over Q3 December 2012.

The broader markets continue to outperform the benchmark indices- BSE Midcap and Smallcap indices have surged over 1.2%.

The market breadth in BSE remains firm with 1,442 shares advancing and 984 shares declining.