Markets come off day highs

Reliance, bank shares continue to lead gains

Markets have come off their day highs as profit taking was seen at higher levels. The Sensex has advanced 126 points at 16,344. Nifty is up 41 points at 4,961. The Sensex touched an intra-day high of 16,374 and the Nifty at 4,971 so far.

In Asia, Japan's Nikkei average firmed after eight straight weeks of declines, helped by gains from widely held Fast Retailing and Fanuc Corp which outweighed Renesas Electronics' sharp tumble.

All the sectoral indices is in the green with the BSE bankex jumping 1.5% at 11,068. Capital goods, power and auto indices have advanced over 1% each.

BHEL has surged 3% at 215. SBI, Tata Power and Mahindra & Mahindra have added 2-3% each. Hindalco, ICICI Bank, Bharti Airtel and Cipla are some of the other key gainers.

Meanwhile, Gail India has dipped 2.4% to Rs 328. Hindustan Unilever has dropped 1%, along with ONGC and Maruti Suzuki.

Among individual stocks, Dhanlaxmi Bank has rallied 7% to Rs 55.35 on back of huge volumes. The trading volumes on the counter more than doubled with a combined 822,338 shares having changed hands so far, against an average 315,000 shares that were traded daily in past two weeks.

Reliance Infrastructure is trading higher by 2.3% at Rs 474, extending its Friday’s 2% gain, after reporting a healthy 84% year-on-year revenue growth at Rs 7,140 crore for the fourth quarter ended March 2012 on the back of robust improvement in order execution in the EPC segment.

BSE market breadth is positive. Out of 2,537 stocks traded, 1,500 shares have advanced while 938 shares have delcined.