Markets Trade Higher, Auto Stocks Lead

Benchmark indices opened the day higher following a sharp fall seen on Monday, as global cues continued to remain strong. The Sensex was trading with gains of nearly 250 points, while the Nifty was up 66 points in trade.

Most of the auto stocks were seeing good gains in trade with Bajaj Auto, HeroMoto Corp and Maruti Suzuki among the Nifty winners in trade.

Yes Bank saw its share price gain after Moody's upgraded the bank's long-term foreign-currency issuer rating to B3 from Caa1 after the bank's equity capital raise of Rs 15,000 crore.

Banking shares were marginally higher ahead of the RBI's Monetary Policy Committee meeting. Shares in SBI, ICICI Bank, Axis Bank and IndusInd Bank were mildly positive in trade today. Some of these stocks had seen selling pressure on Monday.

Kansai Nerolac saw its share price lose ground after the paints maker reported a 79.42 per cent decline in consolidated net profit at Rs 29.64 crore for the first quarter ended June 30. Among the early Nifty losers were BPCL and IOC.

Reliance shares too saw some buying interest at lower levels. The stock shed as much as 3 per cent on Monday. Meanwhile, the rupee was weak in trade and breached the 75 levels mark to trade at 75.01 to the dollar.