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Benchmark indices are trading higher amid volatility as investors will roll over positions in the futures & options (F&O) segment from September to October series. The September F&O contracts will expire today.
The uptrend is led by buying among metal, financial and capital goods shares.
By 14:25, the Sensex was higher by 87 points at 19,943 mark and the Nifty was up by 26 points at 5,900 levels.
According to Mudit Goyal, technical analyst, SMC Global, “Short term and medium term is still positive for near term till nifty manages to trade above 5700 mark. For coming days, range bound and volatile sessions can be witness. Near term resistance is seen around 6050-6100 and Support is seen around 5800-5780.”
In Asia, markets were left in limbo on Thursday as investors sweated out the latest battle over the U.S. budget, though Tokyo rallied as talk of a corporate tax cut resurfaced.
After a weak start, Japan's Nikkei erased all its losses to be up 1 percent after Kyodo News reported the government would consider cutting corporate taxes, a proposal that has swung in and out of favour for weeks now.
The bounce in shares in turn weighed on the yen, already pressured by Japanese selling for month and quarter-end. The dollar popped up to 98.92 yen, from an early 98.46, while the euro gained almost a full yen to 133.80.
Back home, India's benchmark bond yield dropped as much as 10 basis points in opening trade on Thursday after the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) assured it would provide liquidity to the market and also undertake open market operations if necessary.
The partially convertible rupee was trading stronger after the RBI eased norms for providing swaps to banks that are borrowing funds overseas.
At 14:30 pm, the rupee was trading at 62.18 compared with previous close of Rs 62.44 per dollar.
On the sectoral front, BSE Metal, Capital Goods, Healthcare and Bankex indices have gained by 1% each. However, BSE Oil & Gas index has declined by 1%.
BHEL is the top Sensex gainer, up nearly 5% on short covering. L&T has gained by nearly 1%. The company has bagged new orders worth Rs 2,683 crore in the current month across various segments both in the domestic and overseas markets.
Wipro is trading higher by over 2.4% at Rs 487 in noon deals on the National Stock Exchange (NSE), ahead of its entry into 50-share Nifty.
Other notable gainers are Coal India, Tata Steel, Sun Pharma, Sesa Goa, HDFC, ICICI Bank and Hindalco.
On the gaining side, JSPL, HUL, GAIL and RIL have fallen between 1-2%.
Among broader markets, BSE Midcap and Smallcap indices have surged between 0.2-1%.
The market breadth in BSE remains marginally positive with 1,147 shares advancing and 1,031 shares declining.
