Nifty ends flat ahead of Budget, down by 8 pts

The NSE 50-share Nifty index touched an intraday high of 8,662.60 but could not sustain at that level and ended flat at 8,632.75 -- down 8.50 points.
Nifty snapped a four-day rising trend following fresh selling mainly in auto, banking, finance service and realty stocks on the back of bearish global cues, while sustained buying in infra, energy and pharma sectors arrested further fall.
Overseas, European markets were trading lower as investors looked for cues on corporate earnings as well as concerns over US President Donald Trump's policies on immigration. Asian markets, too, ended lower.
The NSE 50-share Nifty index opened lower at 8,635.55 and hovered between 8,662.60 and 8,617.75 before closing at 8,632.75, a marginal fall of 8.50 points, or 0.10 per cent.

It saw an intra-day movement of about 44.85 points.
On the sectoral front, auto fell by 0.86 per cent, private banks 0.75 per cent, realty 0.39 per cent, PSU banks 0.34 per cent and finance service 0.29 per cent.

However, infra rose by 0.94 per cent, pharma 0.43 per cent and energy 0.28 per cent.
Shares of telecom companies spurted as investors remained optimistic on the sector after Idea Cellular confirmed that it is in talks with Vodafone for merger.
Major index gainers were Idea (25.26 per cent), Bharti Airtel (6.76 per cent), Grasim (4.12 per cent), Reliance (1.92 per cent) and TechM (0.96 per cent).

However, InfraTel fell 7.12 per cent, followed by AuroPharma (2.58 per cent), TataMotors (1.78 per cent), Tata Steel (1.54 per cent) and TataMtrDvr (1.54 per cent).
A total of 989 scrips declined, 651 advanced, while 96 remained unchanged. Total securities that hit their price bands were 122.
Turnover in the cash segment fell to Rs 19,953.40 crs from Rs 24,587.82 crore last Friday.
A total of 11,761.93 lakh shares changed hands in 75,28,573 trades. The market capitalisation of NSE stood at Rs 11,176,762.50 crore.