Nifty ends above 5,300

Markets ended with smart gains on Friday on cues from global peers. The Sensex added 358 points or 2% to 17,503. Nifty added 113 points at 5,333.

Global markets ended higher with exports leading gains. The Nikkei added 1.6% to 9,929. Shanghai Composite and Hang Seng added 0.8% each.

Shares of MCX ended at Rs 1,297 a premium of 25% over the issue price of Rs 1,032. The equilibrium price of the stock discovered through the one-hour call auction from 0900 hrs to 1000 hrs was set at Rs 1,387. The stock touched a high of Rs 1,426 and a low of Rs 1,282 in trades today. Over 6 million shares have changed hands on the counter in BSE so far.

Meanwhile, Commerce Secretary Rahul Khullar said that exports grew by 4.3% year-on-year to $24.6 billion, while imports increased by 20.6% in February. Imports stood at $39.8 billion in February 2012, resulting in a trade deficit of $15.2 billion.

All the sectoral indices gained. BSE metal index gained 4.7% at 11,500. Capital goods, bankex and realty indices were up around 3-4% each.

"On Charts BSE Metal INDEX has given a positive breakout; whereas it have broken the bearish trend line on Monthly charts; best trading strategy would be grab the opportunity to buy metal stocks at dips," said Ravi Nathani, Technical analyst, Nsetoday.com.

ICICI Bank was the top conributor among Sensex stocks and accounted for a 75 points move on the Sensex.

Bank shares gained on hopes of reduction in the cash reserve ratio (CRR) by the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) in its forthcoming monetary policy review. The RBI, which is scheduled to announce its mid-quarter monetary policy on March 15, had slashed the CRR - the proportion of deposits that banks must keep with the central bank by 50 basis points to 5.5% to free primary liquidity worth Rs 32,000 crore in the last policy review.

Metal shares - Jindal Steel and Tata Steel added 6.7% each. Tata Steel has increased price of some of its long products by at least Rs 1,000 a tonne in the current month.

Sterlite and Tata Motors advanced 4.6% each. Among other gainers were SBI, HDFC and Maruti Suzuki.

Larsen & Toubro added 5.2% at Rs 1,302. The board of directors of the company in its meeting held today has decided to bifurcates the role of Chairman and Managing Director into two positions. The company has appointed Mr K Venkataramanan as Chief Executive Office and Managing Director with effect from April 1, 2012 while Mr. A. M. Naik, will continue as Executive Chairman of the Group.

Meanwhile, FMCG shares weakened. Hindustan Unilever was down 0.5% at Rs 382. ITC slipped 0.7% at Rs 208. IT shares -  Wipro and Infosys declined 1-2% each. Mahindra & Mahindra ended flat after it said that it would be observing no production days up to 2 days per week for the rest of March 2012.

BSE market breadth was positive. Out of 2,947 shares traded, 1,845 shares advanced while 989 shares declined.