Nifty closes above crucial 6,500 mark

Indian equity benchmark, Nifty ended Friday's session on a new high level, registering nearly 2 percent gains through the day as strong microeconomic data on domestic front coupled with supportive global cues enthused the market to extend its gains for the fourth straight session. Nifty continued its strong rally during the session without any single instance of profit booking as investors continued their hunt for fundamentally strong stocks. On the global front, Asian markets made a mixed closing, while European shares slipped in early trade on Friday.

Back home, after making a positive start in early trades, Nifty over shadowed its previous session's pleasant rally by an another exuberant performance extending gains to new levels amid buying witnessed across the board. Most realty, banking and finance stocks jumped over 5-6 percent during the day. Sentiments were ecstatic as Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) remained net buyers in domestic equities for the past 15 straight trading sessions and bought Indian equities worth Rs 7,000 crore since February 12. Further, appreciation in Indian rupee against dollar and HSBC survey saying that India’s manufacturing and services sectors expanded at a faster rate than China in February too aided the sentiments. The Index extended gains in late afternoon session as strength in infra and energy stocks provided support. Finally, Nifty ended the session near its intra-day high level with a gain of 125 points.

Meanwhile, sectoral indices on the NSE made positive closing. CNX Realty up by 5.62%, CNX PSU Bank up by 4.05%, CNX Finance up by 4.02%, CNX Infra up by 3.72% and CNX Energy up by 3.32% remained the gainers in the trade. While, CNX IT down by 1.95% and CNX Pharma down by 1.84% were remained the top losers in the trade.

The India Volatility Index (VIX), a gauge for market’s short term expectation of volatility, up by 15.50% and reached 16.7200. The 50-share CNX Nifty increased by 125.50 points or 1.96% to settle at 6,526.65.

Nifty March 2014 futures closed at 6549.70 on Friday at a premium of 23.05 points over spot closing of 6,526.65, while Nifty April 2014 futures ended at 6585.45 at a premium of 58.80 points over spot closing. Nifty March futures saw an addition of 2.30 million (mn) units, taking the total outstanding open interest (OI) to 18.11 mn units. The near month March 2014 derivatives contract will expire on March 27, 2014.

From the most active contracts, Reliance Communications March 2014 futures were at a premium of 1.10 points at 119.10 compared with spot closing of 118.00. The number of contracts traded was 18,471.

HDFC Bank March 2014 futures traded at a premium of 5.25 points at 716.40 compared with spot closing of 711.15. The number of contracts traded was 29,888.

Yes Bank March 2014 futures traded at a discount of 0.35 points at 376.10 compared with spot closing of 376.45. The number of contracts traded was 27,518.

Bharti Airtel March 2014 futures were at a premium of 2.25 points at 303.25 compared with spot closing of 301.00. The number of contracts traded was 21,267.

Reliance Industries March 2014 futures traded at a premium of 1.95 points at 869.85 compared with spot closing of 867.90. The number of contracts traded was 48,772.

Among Nifty calls, 6,400 SP from the March month expiry was the most active call with addition of 1.19 million open interest.

Among Nifty puts, 6,500 SP from the March month expiry was the most active put with an addition of 2.25 million open interests.

The maximum OI outstanding for Calls was at 6,500 SP (4.30 mn) and that for Puts was at 6,200 SP (6.97 mn).The respective Support and Resistance levels of Nifty are: Resistance 6,571.78 -- Pivot Point 6,492.67 - Support -- 6,447.53.

The Nifty Put Call Ratio (PCR), finally stood at 1.46 for March month contract. The top five scrips with highest PCR on OI were AMBUJACEM 1.93, BPCL 1.71, ULTRACEMCO 1.70, AXISBANK 1.69, and BANKBARODA 1.61.

Among most active underlying, State Bank of India witnessed contraction of 0.95 million of Open Interest in the March month futures contract, followed by Reliance Industries witnessing contraction of 1.93 million of Open Interest in the March month contract; L&T witnessed an addition of 0.07 million of Open Interest in the March month futures. ICICI Bank witnessed an addition of 0.21 million of Open Interest in the March month contract and Axis Bank witnessed an addition of 0.08 million in Open Interest in the expiring March month's future contract.