March 28: mid-session report

After four days of holiday Indian markets opened the day in the negative territory taking cues from the other major Asian markets which were trading with negative bias. CNX Metals and CNX Pharma were the biggest drag on the markets.

Nifty was trading down by 29 points at 7687; and Sensex by 121 points at 25215. Both the leading indicators were trading with losses of 0.38 and 0.48 per cent respectively.

The advance-decline ratio showed a similar trend as majority of the counters traded in red. As many as 1437 scrips were trading in the negative zone; 847 scrips were trading in the positive territory; however, 145 stocks remained unchanged on the NSE.

Top Nifty Gainers: Ambuja Cements is leading the gainers' list as it was trading up by close to 2.20 per cent followed by Kotak Mahindra Bank, BPCL, Gail India and Power Grid which were up 1.83; 1.37; 1.15; and 1.09 per cent respectively.

Top Nifty Losers: Vedanta is leading the losers' list down by close to 5 per cent, followed by Hindalco Industries, Sun Pharma, Tech Mahindra and PNB which are down anywhere between 3.50 per cent to 1.90 per cent.

All the major sectoral indices were trading with losses except for BSE IT Index which was up with the gain of 0.05 per cent. BSE Metals and BSE Healthcare Index was the biggest loser in trade as it was down by 2.02 per cent and 1.16 per cent respectively. However, BSE Small-Caps and Mid-caps saw deep cuts as they were trading with the losses of 0.58 and 0.60 per cent respectively.

All the other major Asian markets were trading in mixed territory with many of the Asian markets were close for the day owing to holiday. Chinese CSI300 closed the day down by 0.7 per cent. However, Japan’s Nikkei closed the day with gains of about 0.77 per cent. Share markets in Australia, New Zealand and Hong Kong were closed for holidays.

In commodities, Oil prices rose in early Asian trading on Monday after a three-day break, but volumes were thin as a number of markets remain on holiday for Easter.

Buzzer: - Natco Pharma was buzzing in trade as it was down by close to 14 per cent in trade on the back of US FDA observation for two of its manufacturing units.

In the second half of the day market is likely to remain in the tight range and follow global markets.