Markets stuck in a narrow range

Markets continued to trade in a narrow range with a negative bias in the noon deals. The Sensex moved in a range of 120 points. At 1250 hours the Sensex was at 17,756, down 48 points and the Nifty was at 5,337, lower by 23 points.

According to Hormuz Maloo, technical analyst with Geojit BNP Paribas, "The current short term uptrend started at 4,728 points in the first week of this month - and we are now above 5,300. Therefore a short term downtrend or consolidation is overdue, both in terms of time as well as distance."

Meanwhile, on the corporate front Bank of Baroda announced its second quarter numbers, the Q2 net profit came in higher by 14% at Rs 1,166 crore.  Uco Bank posted net profit of Rs 231 crore during the second quarter. The street is also eyeing the second quarter numbers of ICICI Bank which are to be announced later in the day.

Back to markets, Tata Motors was the top loser among the Sensex stocks, down 3.4% to Rs 199. ONGC shed 2.2% to Rs 278. Sterlite Industries, DLF, Tata Power, BHEL, Hindalco, Cipla, Jindal Steel, Mahindra & Mahindra and J P Associates were also among the laggards.

On the other hand, Wipro was the top gainer. The stock jumped 2.2% to Rs 381 after reporting 1% year-on-year (y-o-y) growth in net profit to Rs 1,301 crore for the quarter ended September 2011 helped by a weaker rupee and rise in spending on outsourcing by overseas clients. Analysts expected a net profit of Rs 1,294 crore from the India’s third largest software services exporter in the recently concluded quarter. NTPC, Infosys, Hero MotoCorp, HDFC Bank, Hindustan Unliver, Tata Steel, Bharti Airtel and SBI were also among the notable gainers on the benchmark index.

Among the individual stocks, Aban Offshore was trading higher by 3% at Rs 438, extending Friday’s 6% rally, after the company extended its contract with an undisclosed operator by a year and this might help it to generate an additional revenue of Rs 192 crore.

Tata Sponge Iron has rallied 11% to Rs 344 after more than doubling its net profit at Rs 21.73 crore for the quarter ended September 2011 on account of large savings on raw material.

Textile stocks were also trading higher on news that the Union Ministry for Textile has granted an integrated Textile Park for Tripura.

On the sectoral front, BSE Oil & Gas index was the top loser, down 1.2% or 116 points at 9,063, Auto index was down 102 points to 9,469. Metal, healthcare, capital goods, PSU, consumer durables and FMCG stocks also witnessed some bit of selling pressure.

At the same time, BSE IT index was the top gainer, up nearly 1% to 5,880. Teck, Bankex and Realty indice were also trading marginally higher.

From the oil & gas space BPCL, Cairn India, HPCL, reliance Industries, Gail India and Oil India were among the top losers. Mphasis, Financial Technologies, Oracle Financial Services Software, Tech Mahindra and Patni Computer were among the top gainers.

The broader markets were trading on a flat note. The BSE mid-cap index was up 25 points at 6,299 and the small-cap index advanced 20 points to 6,980.

The overall breadth was marginally positive as 1,392 stocks were advancing while 1,193 were declining.