The Sensex was down by 8 points, while the Nifty was lower by 2 points in early trade. Among the early gainers was oil exploration company ONGC and two-wheeler major Bajaj Auto.

Other Sensex stocks that were trading with gains included Larsen, NTPC, Tata Motors, Tata Steel, Coal India and Jindal Steel.

Stocks that lost ground were Sterlite Industries, State Bank of India, ICICI Bank and Maruti Suzuki. IT stocks were trading firm with TCS, Infosys, HCL and Wipro amongst the gainers.

High beta infrastructure names saw some buying with prominent gainers including Crompton Greaves and ABB. PSU banking stocks, however, lost ground with IOB, Oriental Bank of Commerce and Punjab National Bank all trading with losses.

Among non index stocks Jet Airways gained almost 5% after media reports suggested that the airliner is the front-runner for an investment by Gulf carrier Etihad Airways.

Geometric Software jumped 5% after the software services firm has acquired 3Cap Technologies GmbH (3Cap), a Munich, Germany-based specialist in electronics engineering for the automotive industry.

Shares of NMDC was weak after the mining major said it had reduced prices of iron ore to align the same with landed imports.

Meanwhile, markets in Asia were trading higher with the Hong Kong's Hang Sang, Singapore's Strait Times and Taiwan's Taiwan Weighted trading higher. The Japanese and the Chinese markets were closed for trading today.

GoodReturns.in