India's benchmark indices closed with nearly 0.5 per cent gains after seesaw trade Wednesday. The Sensex rose 84.87 points to 17,707 closing nearly 100 points off the day's high while the broader Nifty index advanced 33 points (nearly 30 points lower from the intraday high) to 5,368.15.
Barring banking and healthcare stocks, all sectoral indices ended higher on the Bombay Stock Exchange. High beta realty (2.9%) and metal (1.6%) stocks were the biggest gainers. IT stocks (1.7%) also saw strong buying interest.
However, focus was on individual stocks. Shares of Bharti Airtel (-6.5%), India's biggest wireless company, ended at the bottom on the 50-stock Nifty index. The company reported a 1.5% decline in sequential net profit to Rs 1,011 crore on flat traffic growth.
ICICI Bank (-1.8%) was the other big laggard on the Nifty index. The stock saw selling pressure after a subsidiary of Temasek Holdings (a private equity firm) sold over half of its 3.46% stake in the bank today.
The two stocks together contributed nearly 65 index points on the downside on the Sensex.
State owned oil explorer ONGC (-1%) also ended lower after Q3 net profit declined nearly 5% year-on-year.
Reliance Infra (7%) was the top gainer on the Nifty index, followed by Hindalco (4.6%), Jaiprakash Associates (3.8%), Gail India (3.3%), Reliance Power (3.2%) and DLF (3.2%).
Frontline IT stocks closed higher despite tech lobby Nasscom forecasting slower growth for the industry. Nasscom estimates Indian IT services & BPO revenues to grow at 11-14% to $76-78 billion in the next fiscal. Wipro (1.8%) and Infosys (1.6%) ended up. TCS (1.6%) said it has formed a joint venture with Mitsubishi Corp. to provide IT services to Japanese firms.
The market breadth was positive with over 70% stocks rising on the broader BSE 500 index.
Most analysts expect some consolidation at these levels. "We should see some profit booking around 5,400-5,450 levels...we have moved too fast too soon. There is still a lot of uncertainty over Greece... Nobody knows the exact amount required, so I am circumspect on that front," Daljeet Kohli, Head (Research) at IndiaNivesh Securities told NDTV Profit today.
"The daily indicators are overbought... 5,434 is a crucial resistance going forward. All high beta stocks are likely to fall in the next few sessions," Somil Mehta, Senior Technical Research Analyst (Equity) at Sharekhan told NDTV Profit.
Global cues were supportive. Asian stocks closed with big gains and European indices traded higher when India's markets closed today.