Sensex ends up 86pts

The markets opened in red mirroring weak cues from the global markets. The benchmark indices, however, soon rebounded in green owing to fresh buying interest in auto and banking stocks. Select PSU stocks, too, were buzzing on disinvestment hopes. Meanwhile, the US markets which ended in red on Friday casted a bearish shadow on the Asian markets this morning.

The Sensex touched a low of 17,506 in opening trades, but recovered and rallied to a high of 17,713 - up 207 points from the day's low. The Sensex finally ended with a gain of 87 points at 17,641.The NSE Nifty ended up 23 points,  at 5,275.

Banking stocks led the rally. The BSE bankex jumped 2.4% to 10,161. The Auto index was up 1.7% at 7,569. However, metal index slipped in trades as metal prices in the London Metal Exchange fell.

HDFC Bank surged 4.5% to Rs 1,767. Other banking stocks advanced. ICICI Bank jumped 2.6% to Rs 863.

Hero Honda gained 4.4% at Rs 1,695. Mahindra & Mahindra added 2% to Rs 1,178. Tata Motors was up 1.5% at Rs 808.

Wipro, HDFC, Maruti Suzuki and Bharti Airtel also advanced.

TCS added 1% to Rs 800 on a better-than expected Q3 result.

However, Jaiprakash Associates dropped 1% to Rs 163. Grasim dropped 2% to Rs 2,787. Tata Steel and Tata Power declined 1% each.

Reliance slipped 1% to Rs 1,100.

The market breadth was marginally positive - out of 2,993 stocks traded, 1,576 advanced and 1,346 declined on the BSE.