Sensex, Nifty Off Day's Highs; Banking, Auto Stocks Underperform

Eight of 11 sector gauges compiled by the National Stock Exchange were trading higher led by the Nifty Metal index's over 4 per cent gain.

The Indian equity benchmarks came off intraday highs in noon deals on the back of weakness in select banking, auto and information technology shares. The benchmarks staged a gap up opening wherein the Sensex advanced as much as 468 points to hit an intraday high of 49,417.64 and Nifty 50 index briefly moved above its important psychological level of 14,850. As of 1:37 pm, the Sensex was up 158 points to 49,108 and Nifty 50 index rose 69 points to 14,793. "If Nifty sustains above 14,750 we can expect a rally to continue in the market till the level of 14,900. 14,900 will act as a resistance in the short term. Technical factors in the market are aligned to show that the market will trade in a range of 14,500-14,900," Gaurav Garg, head of research, CapitalVia Global Research told NDTV. Eight of 11 sector gauges compiled by the National Stock Exchange were trading higher led by the Nifty Metal index's over 4 per cent gain. Media and realty sector gauges were also trading higher with gain of 2 and 0.75 per cent each respectively.