Nifty ends higher led by European cues; metals rally

The benchmark Nifty recouped previous day's losses and closed just one point short of the 5,400 level led by technology, metal, oil & gas, auto, cement and realty companies' shares. ICICI Bank, L&T and ITC were the other gainers.

However, the sell-off in telecom companies' shares along with HDFC, HDFC Bank, Axis Bank, SBI, BHEL, HUL, NTPC, Sun Pharma, ABB and Cipla capped the gains to some extent.

It was the seventh consecutive session that the markets witnessed consolidation. "The Nifty is likely to trade rangebound between 5,410 on the upside and 5,330-5,370 on the downside," said Deven Choksey, MD, KR Choksey Securities.

"This band is expected to be broken only when some of the big names or index heavyweights start participating in this particular game. These include the likes of Reliance (its results on July 27) and some capital goods and realty players," he added.

Global cues kept the indices in positive terrain on Wednesday. European markets like France's CAC, Britain's FTSE and Germany's DAX were trading 1.77%, 1.57% and 1.37% higher, at the time of closing of Indian equities.

Buying in technology post Apple's upbeat revenue forecast, financials ahead of stress tests on 91 European banks and mining companies' shares after 16% quarterly rise in iron ore output of BHP Billiton helped the European markets today. The US index futures were marginally in the green.