Sensex scales back after weak start

Just when we thought that markets were going to witness a sharp decline on account of weakness in the global markets, the Indian equity indices defied the weakness and ended with smart gains on Monday. The movement throughout the day was however quite choppy ahead of the F&O expiry, as the benchmark indices were mostly traded in narrow trading range. The Capital Goods, Pharma, Banking and the IT stocks were among the top gainers which saw the NSE Nifty end above the 5700 mark. Even the Small-Cap index ended with modest gains. However, the BSE Mid-Cap index ended in the red. Among the other major losers were the FMCG, Consumer Durables and the Metals stocks. Finally, the BSE Sensex closed at 18,793, up 111 points over the previous close. It had earlier touched a day's high of 18,809 and a day's low of 18,600. It opened at 18,655. The NSE Nifty ended at 5,717, up 32 points over the previous close. It earlier touched a day’s high of 5,721 and a day’s low of 5,658. It opened at 5,667. The BSE Small-Cap index was trading flat, while BSE Mid-Cap index was trading down 0.22%. HC, Bankex, IT, Teck, OIL&GAS, Power, PSU, Consumer Durables, Capital Goods indices are the gainers. FMCG, Realty, Auto, Metal, Consumer Durables indices were the losers. RIL, TCS, L&T, Tata Power, Coal India, Bajaj Auto, Sun Pharma, Bharti Airtel, ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank, NTPC, were among the major gainers in BSE Sensex and Nifty. While, Wipro, ONGC, Tata Motors, HDFC, Sterlite Inds, Sesa Goa, ITC, Lupin, were among the major losers in Sensex and Nifty, The INDIA VIX on NSE slipped 10% to end at 13.01. It hit a day’s high of 14.37 and a day’s low of 12.87. L&T posted better growth for Q2 as it has posted a net profit of Rs11373.10mn for the quarter ended September 30, 2012 as compared to Rs7983.90mn for the quarter ended September 30, 2011. The stock gained by 2.2% to end at 1670. While HDFC posted a net profit after tax of Rs11511.20mn for the quarter ended September 30, 2012 as compared to Rs9707mn for the quarter ended September 30, 2011. The stock declined by 0.5% to close at 749. In other Corporate News, MCX Stock Exchange (MCX-SX) has received over 700 applications for new membership for all segments. Globally, the Asian markets ended with a slight positive bias after the equity markets in China and Japan recovered early losses to end marginally higher. The Nikkei index in Japan edged higher by 0.10% to close at 9010, the Hang Seng index in Haong Kong was up 0.7% to close at 21697 while the ASX 200 index ended lower by 0.66% to end at 4541. In Europe, stock markets were trading with slight positivity led by the banking stocks. The FTSE index in UK edged higher by 0.2%, DAX index in Germany was almost unchanged and the CAC index in France was trading slightly higher by 0.2%. The U.S. stocks witnessed a sharp decline on Friday after disappointing earnings reported on the street, particularly in the technology sector. The major indices suffered their worst single-day drop since June, The Dow Jones index ended lower by 1.5%, S&P 500 index declined by 1.66% while the Nasdaq index fell by 2%.