Markets gain third straight day

Markets gained for the third straight session on Thursday led by Bharti Airtel on expectation that the telecom major could emerge as one of the major beneficiaries following today’s Supreme Court verdict.

The 30-share Sensex ended above the 17,000 mark for the third straight session up 131 points at  17,432 and the 50-share Nifty ended up 34 points to close at 5,270.

The Supreme Court today cancelled licences given to the telecom firms involved in 2G spectrum allocation scam. A total of 122 licences had been issued since January 2008.

According to Deven Choksey, Chief executive officer, KR Choksey securities, "The market is viewing it positively and will only recover because the earlier licences which have been cancelled will be re-issued after the revised guidelines come out and the monetary considerations will be swapped against the new licences."

The Asian markets ended the day on a strong note with Shanghai and Hang Seng closing higher by 2% each and the Nikkei also edged higher by nearly 1% in trades today. Meanwhile, the European markets were trading on a flat note.

Bharti Airtel was the top gainer among the Sensex stocks, up 7% to Rs 386. DLF also ended higher by 4% at Rs 226. Sterlite Industries, Wipro, Gail India, Hindalco, Hero MotoCorp, Mahindra & Mahindra, TCS, ICICI Bank, BHEL, Coal India and HUL also advanced 1.3-4% each in trades today.

Information technology shares also witnessed buying, the BSE IT index ended higher by 1.5% at 5,860 levels. Metal, Capital Goods, Realty, Power, PSU, Bankex and Oil & Gas indices also ended higher by 0.2-1.4% each.

At the same time, healthcare, FMCG and consumer durable stocks faced the selling pressure and ended lower by 0.3-0.6% each.

Among the individual shares, ACC ended higher by 5% at Rs 1,260, its highest level since October 2007, after its sales grew nearly 9% to 2.23 million tones (mt) in January compared to the same month a year ago.

Hexaware Technologies was the top gainer from this pack, up 11% to Rs 97 on reporting a net profit of Rs 88.25 crore for the quarter ended December 2011, as compared to Rs 39.60 crore in the corresponding quarter of previous year.

Aban Offshore has rallied 14% to Rs 544, extending its 7% gains after the company's international operations, undertaken through special purpose vehicles, have shown better performance than domestic business during the quarter ended December 2011.

The broader markets also advanced half a per cent each by the close. The BSE mid-cap index ended higher by 32 points at 5,969 levels and the small-cap index jumped 35 points to close at 6,609 levels.

The overall breadth was positive as 1,573 stocks advanced while 1,295 declined.