Sensex up 230 points as buying continues; Tata Motors up nearly 6%

The market, which shrugged off a cautious start and rallied sharply to hit the day's high a little before noon, continues to trade firm thanks to sustained buying in several blue chip stocks from across various sectors.

The Sensex, which rose to 16,499.55, is now up 230 points or 1.4% at 16,462.54. At 4950.70, a few points off the day's high of 4964, the Nifty is now up 62.65 points or 1.3% over its previous closing mark.

While most of the markets in the Asian region posted strong gains today, European markets are exhibiting a mixed trend. Still, investors back home are seen lapping up stocks amid hopes of a quick solution to the ongoing financial crisis in the Euro Zone. Expectations of fairly good quarterly numbers from some top notch companies too appear to be contributing to the rally to an extent.

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Realty, information technology, automobile, power and metal stocks are mostly trading notably higher. Bank stocks too are trading firm. Oil majors and index heavyweights Reliance Industries (2.4%) and ONGC (2.3%) are also up sharply.

Tata Motors, the top gainer among Sensex stocks, is up 5.8% at Rs 168. On Friday, the company introduced its Manza sedan and Prima range of trucks in South Africa at the Johannesburg International Motor Show. Tata Motors sells its passenger vehicles and light trucks in South Africa through a local joint venture between group company Tata Africa Holding and South Africa's Associate Motor Holdings.

In September, Tata Motors' total sales rose 22% to 78,786 units. The firm's total passenger vehicles sales in the domestic market stood at 26,319 units in September, up 10.22% from 23,877 units in the same month last year. The company's total exports grew by 23% to 6,220 units in September 2011 over September 2010.

Tata Power has surged 4.3% to Rs 102.60. DLF has notched up a gain of 3.2% at Rs 225.80. Hindalco, Tata Steel, Sterlite Industries and HDFC are trading higher by 2% - 3%.

BHEL is up by about 2% on the back of reports the company has bagged an order worth Rs 40,710 million for setting up a 2x600 MW thermal power generating unit for Singareni Collieries Company Limited's upcoming coal-based super thermal power project in Andhra Pradesh.

NTPC, Infosys, ICICI Bank, Bajaj Auto, Wipro, Tata Consultancy Services and Bharti Airtel are up 1.2% to 1.8%. Hero Motocorp, Jaiprakash Associates, HDFC Bank, Hindustan Unilever and Cipla are also trading firm.

Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd has informed that there has been no production at the company's plant located at Rudrapur, Uttarakhand for the past three days on account of curfew imposed by the authorities in the town of Rudrapur. As a result of the curfew, the employees/workers were not able to report to duties. Due to adequate availability of stocks this production loss would not have any material impact in the short term on sales volume. In this regard, the Company has now informed that, the curfew has since been relaxed during day time and the Rudrapur Plant has resumed operations. The stock is up by about 1% at Rs 804 now.

IDFC has surged 3.7% to Rs 120.80. Sesa Goa, HCL Technologies, Reliance Infrastructure, Reliance Power, Axis Bank, GAIL and Kotak Bank are up 1% - 2.3%. Siemens, Power Grid Corporation and Ranbaxy Laboratories are also trading notably higher.

Maruti Suzuki, down 2.2% at Rs 1088, continues to languish in negative territory due to the ongoing labour unrest in the company's Manesar plant. Sun Pharmaceuticals, Larsen & Toubro, Jindal Steel and Ambuja Cements are trading lower by 0.4% to 1.4%.

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TTK Prestige Ltd has a net profit of Rs. 337.10 million for the quarter ended September 30, 2011 as compared to Rs. 218.00 million for the quarter ended September 30, 2010. Total income increased from Rs. 2009.30 million for the quarter ended September 30, 2010 to Rs. 3044.70 million for the quarter ended September 30, 2011. The stock is up 6.3% at Rs 2784 at present.

Mahindra Satyam is up by over 3% at Rs 69.50 on reports the company has partnered with iPipeline, a specialist in providing innovative marketing, selling and processing solutions to the banking, financial services and insurance and markets. As part of the partnership, Mahindra Satyam will position iPipelines customer relationship management tools for financial services to banking and financial services clients in the Middle East.