BSE Sensex flat in trade, retreats from three-year high

Reuters Market Eye - The BSE Sensex is flat on profit-taking after earlier touching its highest intraday level since November 2010. The 50-share Nifty is also flat in trade.

Housing Development Finance Corporation Ltd is down 0.5 percent after reporting its July-September results.

UltraTech Cement Ltd recovers from early falls and is up 0.3 percent. The stock falls as much as 4.6 percent in early trade after the country's largest cement maker posted a 52 percent fall in net profit for the July-September quarter.

Technology shares fall on profit-taking. Infosys Ltd down 0.7 percent while Tata Consultancy Services Ltd falls 3 percent.

Hindalco Industries Ltd gains 2.8 percent after Prime Minister Manmohan Singh's office says he is satisfied with the outcome of the process of allocating coal blocks to certain companies, dealers say.

Hindalco had said earlier this month it was being investigated for the coal block allocation case.

J.P.Morgan assumes coverage of Cairn India Ltd CAIL.NS with an "overweight" rating and a target price of 400 rupees, from a "neutral" rating with a 315 rupees target price as of October 2011.

Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) bought Indian cash shares worth 17.52 billion rupees on Friday, marking their biggest single-day buying in over a month.

(Reporting by Abhishek Vishnoi)