Markets end with steady gains; Nifty may consolidate near 15,200

Markets ended the day on a very flattish note with gains of 0.15 percent in NIFTY50 closing just below 15,200 for the day. After a gap-up opening, the benchmark index lost its early gains and made a low of 15146.50, then reclaimed on fresh buying and settled at 15, 184.40 levels with a marginal gain of 10 points. BankNifty gained almost 1 percent in a day to close at 34,943.60 levels.

On the sectoral front, Nifty Pharma, oil and gas and capital goods performed well along with the Nifty Midcap and Smallcap index. IOC, BPCL, SBI, Larsen and Toubro, Axis Bank were the top gainers. Shree Cement, JSW Steel, Tata Steel, Britannia were the laggards for the day.

According to Sumeet Bagadia, Executive Director, Choice Broking, "technically, the Nifty index has breached the prior resistance of 15,044levels and sustained above the Falling Trendline as well as the Ichimoku Cloud formation that suggests a bullish strength in the counter. An oscillator Stochastic and MACD also suggested positive crossover on the daily time-frame which further added strength in the counter. At present, the Nifty seems to have an immediate resistance at 15,340 levels and major resistance is intact at 15450 levels while support is placed at around 15,000 levels."

The returning of business activities is seen in many states after the localized lockdowns, though still some curtailment is present in the movements in these areas. With oil marketing companies garnering the gains in today's trading session with IOC gaining by 4.89% to 109.40 and BPCL gaining by 2.77% to 473.80 among the NIFTY50 stocks. On the other end stocks like Shree Cement and JSW Steel witnessed the losses of over 2% in today's trading session.

Mohit Nigam, HeadPMS, Hems Securities said, "the markets are expected to remain muted in the trading on Tuesday, expecting to consolidate around the 15,200 levels with support of 15,000 acting as psychological mark for many traders."

Shrikant Chouhan, Executive Vice President, Equity Technical Research at Kotak Securities, said the market has set a doji star formation that will invite major volatility on Tuesday. "We can consider it as consolidation before heading for the levels of 15,400/15,450. On Tuesday, initially, we would see the market to trade in a range of 15,125 and 15,275 levels, however, in the second half of the session we would see a trending activity in the direction of the break of the given trading range. The focus should be on auto, realty and infra stocks," he added.