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Markets came off their day highs after the first hour of trade as investors booked profit in FMCG majors ITC and Hindustan Unilever.
At 10:30AM, the 30-share Sensex was up 158 points at 19,569 after hitting an intra-day high of 19,640 and the 50-share Nifty was up 47 points at 5,884 after touching an intra-day high of 5,900.
Index heavweight Reliance Industries led the Sensex gainers along with ITC and Larsen & Toubro.
Hindustan Unilever was up 2.2% at Rs 614. The stock had rallied over 4% in early trades to touch an all-time high of Rs 631.95 after its parent company Unilever said it has acquired 14.8% stake against target of 22.5% in Indian unit o
Other Sensex gainers include, ONGC, HDFC Bank, Tata Motors and TCS.
Sensex losers include, ICICI Bank and Infosys among others.
Among other shares, BGR Energy Systems has dipped nearly 5% to Rs 121 after the promtoers’s 3% share sale commenced on bourses.
Accelya Kale Solutions Ltd (formerly Kale Consultants) has surged 13% to Rs 516, extending its previous day’s gain, after the company said it has won an outsourcing contract from Garuda Indonesia, the national carrier of Indonesia. The financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
The broader market was also trading firm with both the BSE Mid-cap and Small-cap indices up over 0.8% each.
Market breadth was positive with 1,093 gainers and 495 losers on the BSE.
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(Updated at 9:20AM)
Markets opened on firm note this Friday tracking gains in the Asian shares after global central banks continued with their easy monetary policy.
European Central Bank President Mario Draghi pledged yesterday to keep interest rates at a record low for an “extended period’’.
Meanwhile the Bank of England also cautioned investors they were being too quick to bet on higher UK rates.
At 9:20AM, the 30-share Sensex rose 182 points at 19,592 and the 50-share Nifty gained 51 points at 5,887 levels.
The rupee also opened firm against the dollar amid dollar selling by banks and inflows of Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) in equity.
The rupee is currently trading at Rs 60.04 compared with previous close of Rs 60.13.
Caution, however, remained ahead of the US jobs data which may show employers added almost as many workers last month as in May and the jobless rate probably fell, according to Bloomberg survey.
Nikkei dropped 1.4% to 14,194, Singapore Straits Times rose 0.6% to 3,165, China’s Shanghai Composite index was up 0.1% at 2,001 while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng gained 1.3% to 20,746 today.
Back home, FMCG, realty, capital goods, PSU, power index gained while metal sector dropped on the BSE.
The key gainers included counters such as HUL rising 4%, Jindal Steel added 1.3%, ONGC rose1.7%, L&T and NTPC gained 1.2-1.4% on the BSE.
The laggards included names like Dr Reddy’s and Maruti Suzuki dropped 0.4% on the BSE.
The broader markets traded higher with mid-caps and small-caps gaining 0.2-0.5 per cent on the BSE.
The market breadth was positive. Out of 329 stocks traded so far, 273 stocks advanced while 48 declined on the BSE.
