UPTREND

Once again the markets opened on a positive note, for the third consecutive session , but continued to trade almost flat for the initial two hours of the trading session but after the initial two hours, the markets started gaining strength with every passing hour and ultimately both the indices closed near their highest point of the day. The Nifty and the Sensex closed up by 55 & 169 points respectively. The market breadth was also positive with 939 advances to 587 declines. On the sectoral front, the Banking sector was the biggest gainer, followed by the Energy & Metals sectors. On the individual stocks front, Jindal Steel, BHEL, ONGC, IDFC & BPCL were the top five Nifty gainers, while Hind Unilever, Tata Motors, Ranbaxy, Maruti & Bajaj Auto were the top five Nifty losers for the day. On the institutional side, FIIs continued with their massive buying spree for the third consecutive day, where they were net buyers to the tune of 1611 crores while as expected the DIIs were net sellers to the tune of 799 crores in the cash market.

On the derivatives side, FIIs were net buyers in Index futures and Options to the tune of 596 & 1544 crores respectively, while they were net sellers in Stock futures and Options, to the tune of 13 & 46 crores respectively. Nifty future settled at 5909, with 29 points premium to the spot, along with a considerable addition of open interest. On the Options side PCR stood at 0.97, with a marginal fall in the India VIX by 1.43%. On the Call options side, the 6000 Call added the maximum open interest, followed by the 5900 call, while there was uniform loss of open interest from the 5400 to 5700 calls. On the Put options side, the 5900 put added the maximum open interest, followed by the 5800, 5400, 5700 & 5500 puts. The entire activity in the cash market was sector specific, while in F&O space the market participants continued to add on to their long positions.

On the technical side, Nifty continued to make new highs, post the breakout on Tuesday, and the F&O data suggests that there may be still more upside left, before the markets become overbrought, in the short term. The levels to watch out for Nifty will be 5900, 5921 & 5958 on the upside, and 5842 & 5805 on the downside. On the currency front, the Rupee rose for the third straight session. helped by capital inflows on optimism that the government will be able to win a vote in parliament and push through key reforms. The partially convertible Rupee finally closed at 54.26, while the near month USD-INR future settled at 54.60 for the day.

On the international markets front, the Asian markets closed on a fairly positive note, while the European and the U.S. markets have closed almost flat. On the energy futures front both the Brent and WTI crude oil futures have closed up by 0.42 & 0.95% at 111.23 & 88.91 $/bbl respectively, while the Natural gas future has closed down by 2.38% at 3.56 $/MMBtu.