Bulls give up early lead

Today's major news

Shree Renuka Sugars buys 51% in Brazil’s sugar firm; the stock jumps 3.70%

Ambuja Cements plans capital expenditure; the stock slides 0.76%

Tantia Constructions builds on new order; the stock slips 0.36%

Emami to enter food and beverage sector; the stock closes 2.67% higher

Larsen & Toubro launches asset management operations; the stock rises 0.81%

Post-market summary

Global signals

European stocks fell on early trades, snapping five days of consecutive gains led by drug makers with GlaxoSmithKline hit by fresh criticism on its diabetes drug. At the time of writing this report, FTSE 100 was up 0.22%.

All the major Asian indices except Shanghai Composite closed positive. SGX Nifty closed 9 points higher.

US stock futures opened high on Monday pointing to a stronger start for Wall Street.

Indian indices

Bulls started off well, maintained the hold for two-third of the session but begin to gradually lose the hold after that on continued selling in consumer durable and realty stocks to finish the day marginally higher. The day’s high was 16423 and the low was 16191. At finishing line, the Sensex closed at 16237, 45 points higher. Nifty closed 11.50 points higher at 4856.

Market sentiment

Despite ending high the advance/decline, the number of advancing shares to declining shares, was negative. Of the 2,907 stocks traded on the BSE, where only 906 stocks advanced, 1,924 stocks declined. Seventy-seven stocks closed unchanged

Sectoral & stock screening

Consumer durable and realty stocks played crucial role in pulling the market down with the BSE CD and BSE Realty down by 1.04% and 1.77% respectively. Information technology (IT) stocks had a good outing with the BSE IT up by 1.01%. The remaining sectors were either marginally up or down for the day.

On news of Shree Runuka Sugars acquiring 51% stake in Brazil’s sugar firm the former surged 3.70%, the most for any stock, followed by Hindalco Industries that increased 2.60% and Oriental Bank that rose 2.50%. Among losers, Chambal Fertilisers & Chemicals slipped the most by 5.64% that remained the highest loser in A group followed by Hindustan Copper that down by 4.90%.

Viewing volumes

Unitech, India’s second largest realty company, was the most actively traded share with over 6.63 crore shares changing hands on the BSE followed by wind power major Suzlon Energy (4.06 crore shares), India's biggest sugar refiner Shree Runuka sugars (3.69 crore shares), industrial finance company IFCI (2.58 crore shares) and Bajaj Holdings (2.48 crore shares).