Sensex down over 100 pts; ICICI Bank, L&T drag

TCS, Wipro and Sesa Sterlite are up between 1-3%, ITC, Cipla, Bajaj Auto, Infosys, are other heavyweight gainers. L&T, ICICI Bank and BHEL are down between 3- 5.4%;

Markets extended lossos in the noon deals following profit booking at higher levels with the Sensex down 122 points at 21,204 and the Nifty gave off 50 points to trade at 6,314. The one weighing on the indices were ICICI Bank, L&T, NTP, ONGC and HDFC.

Profit booking was visible in the broader markets too with the midcap index down 0.6% and the smallcap index gave off 0.8%, both underperforming the Sensex which was down 0.5%.

Except Teck, IT and FMCG indices, all the other indices were in the negative.

Power, Realty, Bankex and Capital Goods indices down 2-4% were the top sectoral losers.

Oil & Gas, Metal, Consumer Durables and Health Care indices were down 0.1-0.7%.

IT majors TCS, Infosys and Wipro added 1-4% and were the top gainers among Sensex-30.

ITC, Cipla, Sesa Sterlite, RIL, Baja Auto and Hero MotoCorp up 0.4-1.5% were the only other gainers.

The market breadth was negative. 1398 stocks declined while 779 stocks advanced on the BSE.
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(Updated at 1300 hrs)
Market continues to trade in a narrow range while bechmarks remain subdued due to profit book in heavyweights. A day earlier investors went all guns blazing for frontline stocks which lifted becnhmarks to lifetime closing highs.

The 30-share BSE Sensex was trading at 21,253 levels down 73 points while the broader 50-scrip Nifty index of NSE was at 6,330 levels down 34 points.

In broader markets, both BSE mid-cap and small-cap indices were down between 0.2 - 0.4%.

"Yesterday's session saw a gap up in trade with both the benchmarks Sensex and Nifty scaling to lifetime highs and recording a life high close as well on account of political developments over the weekend. Today's opening in the red is a natural reaction post spectacular upmove."

"It would be too early to say if the current trend has reversed but the coming sessions would surely be volatile as markets would now focus on Fed meet and RBI policy meet both scheduled for next week," said Ranak Merchnant, Tecnical analyst at SMC Global.

The rupee is trading at 61.20-a-dollar versus its close of 61.13/14 on Monday, tracking the dollar's losses versus other Asian currencies. Almost all Asian currencies trading stronger compared to the dollar.

Asian markets are lower today as Chinese and Hong Kong shares fall. The Shanghai Composite is off 0.16% while the Hang Seng is down 0.17%. The Nikkei 225 is not tradin

Back home, TCS, Wipro and Sesa Sterlite are up between 1-3%, ITC, Cipla, Bajaj Auto, Infosys, are other heavyweight gainers. L&T, ICICI Bank and BHEL are down between 3- 5.4%;

NTPC is the top Sensex loser today, down 10%, after the Central Electricity Regulatory Commission (CERC) released draft regulations that will decide the multi-year power tariffs for 2014-2019..  

 
Among sectors, IT stocks made a comeback after witnessing selling pressure in the past few sessions.

BSE IT, TECk added 1.5 - 1.9%, FMCG, Healthcare, auto are the other gainers while Power index is down 4.4% pulled down by NTPC, capital goods is down 3.2% on profit booking, banks, realty