Nifty shows smart recovery to end with modest loss

The benchmark Nifty showed smart recovery in the last one hour of trade following bounce back in European markets and closed with modest losses. Heavyweights like Bharti, Reliance Industries, SBI, ITC, NTPC, TCS, Infosys and Wipro helped the markets in recovery.

The Sensex had shed another 278 points in an intraday trade on sharp sell-off in global markets since yesterday. Rising concerns in PIIGS (Portugal, Italy, Ireland, Greece, and Spain) countries were the main reasons behind today's fall - due to which the US markets fell 2-3% on Tuesday. Even commodities also saw sharp decline.

However, the markets managed to recover those losses, as it looked oversold. The European markets, which lost 1% in opening trade, were trading flat at the time of closing of Indian Equities. In Asian markets - only Shanghai recovered in late trade and closed 0.77% higher. However, Hang Seng, Taiwan, Straits Times and Jakarta lost 1.4-3.8%.

The 30-share BSE Sensex closed at 17,087.96, down 49.18 points and the 50-share NSE Nifty at 5124.90, down 23.60 points or 0.46%, which broke the 5100 mark during the day. The Nifty May future also turned into premium after 11 points discount and ended with 5.5 points premium, as per provisional data.

Adrian Mowat, Chief Asian and Emerging Equity Strategist, JPMorgan does not believe that the contagion risk from European situation is as big as the subprime crisis. ''Expect markets to deal with Euro problems shortly,'' he said. On the Indian markets, Mowat advised investors to stay invested in Indian equities.

The board of Mid-Day Multimedia on Tuesday approved merging its print business with Jagran Prakashan. Shares of Jagran fell 3% while Mid Day Multimedia surged 18%.