After touching a low of 16,410 in the morning trades, the markets recovered owing to the buying strength in Infosys, Reliance Industries and Tata Motors. The Sensex was up 60 points at 16,477 and the Nifty added 14 points to touch the 5,000 level.
In the broader markets, the midcap index was up 0.3% underperforming the Sensex and the smallcap index which gained 0.4% each.
Rakesh Gandhi, Sr Technical Analyst - Advisory, LKP Securities expects the market to remain between 4900 and 5000 for the next few days.
Meanwhile, Rupee continues to remain waek at 55.63 against the against the US dollar.
On the global front, the Asian markets advanced on the prospect of stimulus measures to aid China's growth. The ones leading the gains were Taiwan Weighted, Kospi, Shanghai Composite, Hang Seng up 1-2%. Nikkei advanced 0.4%.
Back home, among the sectoral indices, IT, Auto and Oil & Gas indices up 0.6-0.7% were leading the gains. On the negative side, FMCG and Consumer Durables slipped 0.4% and 0.6% respectively.
The movers in the IT space were Consumer Durables. TCS, Infosys which gained 0.7-2%. In the auto space Apollo Tyres, Ashok Leyland, Tata Motors and Maruti Suzuki which added 2% each were the top picks.
In the Oil & Gas counter, Reliance Industries moved up nearly 1% as Morgan Stanley upgraded the company to "equal-weight" from "underweight", maintaining its target price at Rs 703, citing attractive valuations.
The other notable gainers amongst the Sensex stocks were BHEL, Coal India, ONGC, Hero MotoCorp, Mahindra & Mahindra and SBI up 0.5-1%
Amongst the losers were DLF, Hindalco, ITC, Bajaj Auto and HDFC Bank down 0.9-1%.
In other individual stocks, Bajaj Electricals tanked over 7% at Rs 199 on reporting a 15% year-on-year drop in its net profit at Rs 48.99 crore for the quarter ended March 31, 2012 mainly on account of expenses on change in inventories and higher interest cost.
The market breadth in BSE was positive. 1153 stocks advanced while 975 stocks declined.
