Despite a rally of 18 per cent in the past five trading days, derivatives players are not willing to take risks and settled their intra-day positions during the course of the day.
Even though the Nifty July futures clocked trading volumes of 40.6 million shares, the open interest declined by 0.6 million shares at the day's close. Similarly, the Nifty August futures recorded trading volumes of four million shares, but only 1.8 million shares were carried forward.
The Nifty July futures contracts witnessed profit-taking above the 4490-4500 levels as Bloomberg data shows that the number of sell bids at those levels were higher than the buy bids. Almost 25 per cent of the trades were initiated at the above mentioned levels, indicating resistance.
The top index gainers included ICICI Bank, HDFC, State Bank of India, Bhel, Reliance Industries, Reliance Communication and Suzlon and these accounted for most of the trading activity. ICICI Bank, for example, gained 12 per cent and the open interest declined by 0.4 million shares, indicating profit booking at higher levels.
The 4200-4400 call options witnessed profit-booking, while fresh call writing was seen at the 4500 strike price. However, the call writers did not carry forward their short positions. Only 96,200 shares were carried forward despite intra-day trading volumes of 6.9 million shares.
