Markets recover from day's lows; ICICI Bank, SBI up 2%

Markets recovered from day's lows but continued to remain volatile helped by a rebound in bank and information technology shares even as select index heavyweights capped upside gains.

At 2:30PM, the 30-share Sensex was up 6 points at 27,463 and the 50-share Nifty was down 8 points at 8,334.

Meanwhile, foreign portfolio investors turned net sellers in equities worth Rs 521 crore on Thursday, as per provisional data. They were net buyers in the previous six trading sessions.

The Indian rupee was trading marginally higher to the US dollar at 62.56 compared to the previous close of 62.67.

BSE IT, Bankex and Capital Goods indices were among the top gainers while Healthcare, Realty, FMCG, Oil and Gas indices were among the top losers.

IT majors were trading higher after global consulting major Accenture Plc raised its full-year revenue growth forecast for the current year. Infosys was up nearly 3% while TCS gained 1%. However, Wipro was down 2.4%.

Larsen and Toubro (L&T) was up nearly 2% after the company said it has won orders worth of Rs 1,711 crore across various business segments in March 2015.

Bank shares rebounded on shortcovering at lower levels after the sharp fall on Thursday. The Bank Nifty which had hit a three-month low was trading 70 points higher. ICICI Bank, SBI and HDFC Bank were up 0.8-2.3% each.

Tata Motors was up 0.6%. The board approved rights issue in the ratio of 6 equity shares for every 109 held at Rs 450 per share and Rs 271 per share for 'A' Ordinary Share along with buyback of secured debentures worth Rs 1,250 crore maturing on March 31, 2016.

Reliance Industries was down 1.2%. The government today lowered the price of domestically produced natural gas by over 10% to $5.02 per mmBtu from $5.6 per unit, the first ever reduction in the rates of the fuel.

In the defensive space FMCG majors ITC and Hindustan Unilever were down over 1% while pharma shares which had gained recently witnessed profit taking. Sun Pharma, Dr Reddy's Labs and Cipla were down 0.8-1.9% each.

Bharti Airtel trimmed early gains and was down nearly 6% after rising over 13% in the past three weeks. The company in a release said it has renewed 900MHz spectrum in all six circles and added fresh spectrum to 900MHz, 1800MHz and 2100MHz spectrum holdings securing a 20-year roadmap to offer world class voice and data services across 2G, 3G and 4G.

Idea Cellular was also down 5% on profit taking after rising 17% in the past one month. The company said it has retained the crucial 900MHz spectrum and won 54MHz of 900 MHz spectrum, across 9 leadership services areas that contribute over 73% of its revenue.

In the broader market, the BSE Mid-cap index was down 0.4% and the Small-cap index was down 0.6%.

Market breadth was weak with 1,830 losers and 901 gainers on the BSE.