Sensex, Nifty open flat; financial, construction stocks drag

Mumbai (Maharashtra) [India], May 16 : Domestic indices opened flat on Tuesday morning as losses in financial and construction stocks dragged the key indices.

Investors are keeping a wait-and-watch mode for the various earning announcements of companies such Bharti Airtel, Bank of Baroda, Indian Oil and V-Mart Retail lined for the day.

BSE Sensex opened 91 points lower to 62,254.21 while NSE Nifty dropped 16.70 points to 18,382.15 at 10.50 am on Tuesday morning.

The top gainers on Nifty 50 were Hindalco, Cipla, Divis Lab, Asian Paints and Infosys while the losers were Maruti, Mahindra & Mahindra, Apollo Hospitals, Adani Enterprises and Kotak Bank. HDFC and HDFC Bank were among the biggest laggard in the opening trade.

In the Asian markets, Hong Kong's Hang Seng surged 78 points, Japan's Nikkei gained 239 points, China's Shanghai, the Philippine Stock and KSE 100 were trading in the positive territory.

In the US markets, Dow Jones went up 48 points, Nasdaq, NYSE and S-P Composite were trading in the positive territory and S-P/BMV IPC went up 313 points on Monday closing.

In the European markets, Amsterdam Exchange, BEL, CAC and Deutsche Borse were trading in the positive territory and FTSE 100 went up 23 points when the Asian markets opened on Tuesday morning.

Sensex and Nifty closed Monday's trade up 0.5 per cent each. Hero Motocorp, Tata Motors, ITC, Tech Mahindra, and Hindalco were the top five gainers, whereas Adani Enterprises, Cipla, BPCL, Grasim Industries, and Divis Labs were the top five losers.

Oil prices rose for a second day early on Tuesday, as US plans to purchase oil for the Strategic Petroleum Reserve (SPR) lent support while raging wildfires in Canada fuelled supply worries.

According to the provisional data available on the NSE, foreign institutional investors (FII) bought shares worth Rs 1,685.29 crore, while domestic institutional investors (DII) purchased shares worth a net Rs 191.20 crore on Monday.