Nifty hovers near 4750; auto, FMCG, realty slip

MUMBAI: The National Stock Exchange's Nifty was moving in a narrow range with negative bias as bulls took a breather after a sharp upmove in previous session. Gains in capital goods, metals and power stocks were offset by losses in auto, FMCG and realty space.

At 11:40 am; the Nifty was at 4754.40, down 10.90 points or 0.23 per cent. The broader index touched a high of 4780.55 and low of 4744.10 in trade so far.

The Bombay Stock Exchange's Sensex was at 15907.64, down 31.72 points or 0.20 per cent. The 30-share index touched intraday low of 15879.41 and high of 15992.16.

"On the Daily chart, we are observing a strong bull candle with rising gap. Further, the prices have convincingly closed above the short term 5&20 EMA. This suggests further upside momentum.

In view of the rising Gap on the daily chart, we are of the opinion that momentum on the upside is likely to continue. Any close above 4800 level would confirm a higher top higher bottom formation. In such scenario Nifty may test 4850 - 4900 levels in couple of trading sessions. On the downside, the rising gap area of 4675 - 4636 levels may act as support going forward," said Arihant Capital Market report.

BSE Midcap Index was up 0.50 per cent and BSE Smallcap Index moved 0.54 per cent higher.

Amongst the sectoral indices, BSE Auto Index was down 1.37 per cent, BSE FMCG Index declined 0.25 per cent and BSE Realty Index slipped 0.16 per cent. BSE Capital Goods Index was up 1.06 per cent, BSE Metal Index gained 0.70 per cent and BSE Power Index moved 0.38 per cent higher.

Bajaj Auto (-4.64%), ACC (-2.99%), Mahindra & Mahindra (-2.89%), Hero Moto Corp (-2.84%) and Ambuja Cement (-2.74%) were amongst the Nifty losers.

HCL Tech (4.48%), SAIL (2.51%), BHEL (2.04%), ICICI Bank (1.95%) and Sesa Goa (1.77%) were the major gainers.

The telecoms department plans to impose penalties totaling Rs 1,594 crore on five mobile phone companies for allegedly understating revenues and hence paying lower revenue share during 2006-07 and 2007-08. The department has estimated that Reliance Communications will have to pay penalties to the tune of Rs 551 crore while for Bharti Airtel, it will be Rs 292 crore.

Bharti Airtel was down 2.48 per cent and Reliance Communications declined 2.29 per cent.

Market breadth was positive on the NSE with 819 gainers against 565 losers.

Foreign institutional investors bought shares worth Rs 255.39 crore on Tuesday while Domestic institutional investors bought shares worth Rs 206.51 crore, as per provisional data from stock exchanges.

The Asian markets were mostly in the red. Shanghai Composite was down 0.52 per cent, Hang Seng slipped (-0.46%) and Seoul Composite was 0.41 per cent lower. Nikkei 225 was up 1.30 per cent.