Sensex closes flat, bank stocks gain

A benchmark index of Indian equities markets closed Thursday's trade 42 points or 0.20 percent up amidst derivatives expiry and buying support from foreign institutional investors (FIIs).

The 30-scrip S&P Sensex of the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), which opened at 21,051 points, closed at 21,074.59 points, up 41.88 points or 0.20 percent from its previous day close at 21,032.71 points.

The Sensex touched a high of 21,135.85 points and a low of 21,013.14 points intra-day.

The wider 50-scrip Nifty of the National Stock Exchange (NSE) closed trade at 10.50 points or 0.17 percent up at 6,278.90 points.

"Nifty opened on flat note and was lacklustre for the entire day with vibrant activity was witnessed during end of session. Market ended the December series on a flat to positive with marginal gains during the month," said Shrikant Chouhan, head-technical research, Kotak Securities.

"Rollover for the Nifty and market wide were in line with 3-month average. This signifies that market can remain range bound within the upper and lower band of 6,030-6,440 during Jan series."

In Thursday's trade, healthy buying was observed in bank, consumer durables and metal stocks. However, automobile, healthcare and realty scrips lost.

The S&P BSE bank index was up 69 points followed by consumer durables index which gained 50.43 points and metal index was 48.76 points higher. However, automobile index was down 56.82 points, healthcare index was lower by 30.35 points and realty index fell 2.14 points.

The major Sensex gainers were: Tata Power, up 4.06 percent at Rs.89.70; ONGC, up 2.31 percent at Rs.292.30; HDFC Bank, up 1.83 percent at Rs.669.60; Tata Steel, up 1.53 percent at Rs.424.85 and Wipro, up 1.36 points at Rs.547.65.

The main losers were: Bajaj Auto, down 2.02 percent at Rs.1,949.95; DrReddys Lab, down 1.97 percent at Rs.2,490; Hero MotoCorp, down 1.66 percent at Rs.2,097.50; Reliance Industries (RIL), down 0.94 percent at Rs.887.70 and Tata Motors, down 0.64 percent at Rs.370.20.

Among the Asian markets, Japan's Nikkei closed 1.03 percent up; Hong Kong's Hang Seng was up by 1.13 percent, and China's Shanghai Composite Index was down by 1.58 percent.

In Europe, London's FTSE 100 was trading 0.23 percent up, Germany's DAX Index was up 0.94 percent and the French CAC 40 Index was up by 0.07 percent.