Markets pare gains as ICICI Bank, ONGC slips

Markets slipped from the highs of the day as profit booking in ICICI Bank, Wipro and ONGC weighed on the indices. At 1300 hrs, the Sensex was up 91 points at 20,377 and the Nifty gained 20 points at 6,206.

Earlier in the day, the Sensex had touched a high of 20,443 and the Nifty was at a high point at 6,229.

Meanwhile, the broader markets underperformed with the smallcap index up 0.2% and the midcap index up 0.3%, as compared to the Sensex up 0.5%.

Among the sectoral indices, Bankex turned flat with a negative bias along with Consumer Durables and Health Care indices, down 0.8% each. Meanwhile, the ones gaining were Auto, Realty and Metal indices up 1-2%.

The only Sensex-30 stocks in the red were Wipro, Cipla, Bharti Airtel, Dr Reddys Lab, ICICI Bank and ONGC down 0.7-2.5%.

All the auto names among the Sensex-30 were up 1-3%.

Tata Steel, Coal India, Sun Pharma, Infosys, Reliance Industries and Sterlite up 1-2% were the other notable gainers.

In other stocks, GlaxoSmithkline Consumer Healthcare tanked 7% to Rs 4,729 on profit taking after surging 26% in past one week on the BSE.

The market breadth continued to remain positive. 1165 stocks advanced while 989 stocks declined on the BSE.