Pre-market: Watch out for Jindal Steel, Bharti Airtel

Markets are likely to rebound from their recent lows amid firm global cues tracking overnight gains on Wall Street and firm Asian cues.

At 8:35AM, the SGX Nifty was up 14 points at 6,778

Asian markets were trading firm tracking overnight gains on Wall Street. Japanese market resumed for trading after a holiday on Tuesday. However, Hong Kong shares retreated amid profit taking after recent gains.

The Nikkei was up 0.2%, Shanghai Composite was up 0.2% and Straits Times was up 0.7%.

US shares ended higher on Tuesday on the back of encouraging earnings from large corporates that beat street estimates and gains in Facebook and Twitter shares.

The Dow Jones ended gained 0.5% at 16,535, the broader S&P 500 gained 0.5% at 1,878 and the tech laden Nasdaq ended up 0.7% at 4,104.


Stocks in Focus

Bharti Airtel, the country's largest telecom operator by subscriber base, reported 89% jump in net profit at Rs 962 crore during the January-March 2014 quarter, backed by strong growth in voice and data revenues as a result of discontinuation of freebies which helped pushing tariffs higher.

Cipla will be in focus after the company said it has received demand notice of Rs 81 crore for Ciplox eye drops and Rs 32 crore for Alerid D tablets.

Jindal Steel may face some pressure on weak earnings and downgrade by select brokerages.

Tyre major Ceat posted 3.86% decline in consolidated net profit at Rs 62.42 crore for the fourth quarter ended March 31, 2014. The company had posted a net profit of Rs 64.93 crore for the same period of previous fiscal.

Indian Overseas Bank's gross non-performing asset (NPA) stood at Rs 9,020.48 crore, as compared with Rs 6,607.96 crore in the corresponding quarter of the last financial year
The bank has reported a net profit of Rs 268.3 crore for the quarter ended March 31, 2014, compared with Rs 58.8 crore for the same period last financial year.

The Andhra Pradesh High Court has ordered an interim status quo on the $4-billion deal between Sun Pharma and Ranbaxy Laboratories. The order, issued on Friday, was in response to a petition filed by some individual investors, who alleged insider trading in Ranbaxy shares before announcement of the deal on April 6.

The Foreign Investment Promotion Board (FIPB) is likely to reject HDFC Bank's proposal to allow further foreign holdings as it would cross the 74 per cent sectoral ceiling, officials sources said. Officials of the Department of Economic Affairs and the DIPP were scheduled to meet on Tuesday to discuss the HDFC proposal. However, the proposed meeting was cancelled.