Markets trade with marginal gain

The markets continue to trade with marginal gains, led by gains in ICICI Bank and Larsen & Toubro. The Sensex is now up 10 points at 18,278.

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(Updated at 1230 hrs)

The markets continue to trade in the red though the Sensex is off day's low and has retraced most of its lost ground. Currently the BSE benchmark index is down 22 points at 18,246, regaining 126 points from the day's low thus far. The Nifty too has rebounded and is down eight points at 5,477. The bounce back is due to the gains in the heavyweights like ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank and L&T.

Among the sectoral indices, Oil & Gas index has advanced from the morning lows and is down 0.6% while rate sensitives Realty and Metal are the top losers shedding 0.6% each. On the other hand, Capital Goods and Health Care indices are leading the gains adding 0.3% each.The draggers in the Oil & Gas space is RIL down 1.5% and Petronet LNG losing 0.5%. Earlier the day, RIL fell more than 2% in morning trade as oil sector regulator rejected three new natural gas finds in the eastern offshore KG-D6 block as discoveries.

Apart from RIL, the top losers among the Sensex stocks are Hindalco, DLF and Maruti Suzuki losing 1% each. The other significant losers are SBI, Tata Steel, Tata Power and Tata Motors losing 0.5-0.8%

Cipla up 2%, Reliance Communication, NTPC and Bharti Airtel gaining 1% each are the top gainers on the Sensex.

The market breadth continues to remain negative. Of the total 2647 stocks traded on the BSE, 1366 stocks have declined while 1188 have advanced.