Sensex to open gap-down

On Monday, both the major US and European indices closed in red with loses of close to 1% each. While even all the major Asian markets, in today's trade, were trading in red with loses in of over 1% each, with Hong Kong's Hang Seng losing the most. Beside, Singapore Nifty that opened lower was currently trading 39 points higher to its previous day’s settlement price. On the back of suck weak performance by the global indices, Sensex may open lower with marginal loss and remain lowerand volatile in the days trade. While the traders will be keen on watching RBI's stance on the monetary policy that will be out today which might have a drag on the banking stocks as it was the case yesterday. Among the local indices, the Nifty could test the 5050- 5100 range on the up side while on the up side it could find support at 4900 and 47500. The Sensex is likely to get support at 16606 and may face resistance at 17000.

Owing to the strengthening of dollar that battered commodity shares doubled with selling in the financial stocks, major US indices closed with losses of over 1% each. Dow closed with over 100 points loss for the second straight day, it fell by 104 points or 1.05% lower at 9868, while S&P 500 and Nasdaq slumped by 1.17% and 0.59% respectively.

Among the Indian ADRs trading on the US bourses only Dr Reddy's, Tata Motors, VSNL closed in green with gains of 0.25%-4.45% each, with Tata Motors gaining the most. While the ADRs like Infosys, Satyam, Rediff, ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank and MTNL ended the day with the losses in the range of 0.69%-9.11% each, with Satyam falling the most.

In the commodity space, Crude oil prices fell sharply, with the Nymex light crude oil for November series declining by $1.82 to close at $78.68 a barrel. In the metals space, the Comex Gold for December series slumped by $13.60 to settle at $1042.80 a troy ounce, while Comex Silver for December series slipped by $0.63 to settle at $17.10 a troy ounce.

Daily trend of FII/MF investment in equities

On October 26, 2009, FIIs were the net sellers of the Indian Stocks in the tune of Rs48.80 crore (with the gross purchase of Rs2942.40 crore and gross sales of Rs2991.10 crore). While the Domestic mutual funds mutual funds, on October 23, 2009, were the net seller of the stocks in the tune of Rs308.80 crore (with gross purchase of Rs618.00 crore and gross sales of Rs926.90 crore).

Headlines for the day

Tata Motors Q2 net more than doubles

Tata Teleservices rings in more subscribers, again

Motherson Sumi arm bags Rs1400 crore order from European Companies

Jindal Steel & Power in race for Mongolia's coal mine

Google searches 3G prospects in India

Events for the day

Major results: Aventis, Cadila Healthcare, Ceat, Crompton Greaves, Deepak Fertilizers, Dish TV, GTL, Finolex Cables, Gillette India, HCL Technologies, Himatsingka, IFCI, IPCa Labs, Ispat Industries, Jai Corp, Jet Airways, Kotak Bank, Lanco Infrastructure, Madras Cement, RNRL, Power Finance Coproration, Tata Steel, Reliance Power, Wipro

Major corporate action: Exide Industries and Unichem Lab's ex-date for the interim dividend, ex-date for stock spilt of Educomp Solutions from Rs10 to Rs2 each

RBI's Monetary Policy