Bias may remain positive

After witnessing the surge on Thursday the market is expected to make further headways on mix Asian markets, which are flat in current trades. With no clear direction to proceed, the market is witnessing the brief periods of optimism and threats. The market may see some short-term profit bookings in frontline stocks creating a volatility in the afternoon trades. Among the domestic indices, the Nifty could test higher levels of 4010 and may dip to 3890 on the downside. The Sensex has a likely support at 12900 and may face resistance at 13275.

Major US indices registered significant gains on Thursday with the Dow Jones flared up by 207 points at 11447, the Nasdaq moved up by 27 points to close at 2312.

Except MTNL all the Indian ADRs traded firm on the US bourses. ICICI Bank led the pack with gains of over 9% followed by HDFC Bank, Dr Reddy gaining over 4.53% and Patni Computer jumped 4.08%, while Satyam, Tata Motors, Infosys, VSNL, Wipro and Rediff jumped over 0.50-3% each.

Oil prices fell steeply on Thursday, extending a decline to a three-day record $15.89 a barrel, as natural gas prices tumbled and investors anticipated declining demand. Crude oil prices for August delivery fell $5.31 to close at $129.29 a barrel. In the commodity space, the Comex gold for June delivery gained $8 to settle at $970.70 an ounce.