MUMBAI: Indian markets opened on a positive note Wednesday taking cues from the global peers. Realty, banks and pharma stocks the top sectoral performers while capital goods space was little subdued.

“A gradual resurrection of the uptrend is happening but the momentum would return on closing above 5300. Lower level supports are placed at 5180-5140 band which should cushion the market. Daily stochastic has signaled a bullish crossover while other oscillators remain in bearish mode.

For the day, expect more consolidation in range of 5230-5275 with bullish bias. Banking and realty continued from where they left off in previous trading session advancing in the day’s trade on back of a dovish monetary policy. IT scrips corrected further and curtailed the market gains.

We recommend long positions in Reliance Infra, ICICI Bank, SBI and GE Shipping while we retain our bearish outlook on steel scrips. For IT stocks like TCS and Infosys, the chart setups have turned cautious but not aggressively bearish,” said Edelweiss report.

At 9:18 am, National Stock Exchange’s Nifty was at 5244, up 13.90 points or 0.27 per cent. The index touched a high of 5263.35 and low of 5230.30 in early trade.

Bombay Stock Exchange’s Sensex was at 17506.17, up 45.59 points or 0.26 per cent. The 30-share index hit a high of 17555.55 and low of 17458.76 in trade so far.

BSE Midcap Index was up 0.61 per cent and BSE Smallcap Index moved 1.04 per cent higher.

Amongst the sectoral indices, BSE Realty Index was up 1.99 per cent and BSE Bankex moved 0.96 per cent higher. BSE Capital Goods Index moved 0.28 per cent down.

Axis Bank (4.14%), HCL Tech (3.68%), Unitech (2.93%), DLF (2.29%) and Jaiprakash Associates (1.49%) led the Nifty upmove.

Axis Bank has again demonstrated its ability to grow at a faster pace than the industry, something which its investors have now become accustomed to. During the fourth quarter, the bank reported a growth of 28% in its loan book, significantly higher than the rate of 17% clocked by the industry, after loan growth had slipped to 12.5% in the quarter-to-December ’09.

Unitech has approved the proposal for amalgamation of two wholly owned subsidiaries viz. Aditya Properties and Unitech Holdings, demerger of the infrastructure business and investments in the infrastructure sector, hiving off of the shares and investments held in companies in the telecommunications sectors.

Sun Pharma (-1.06%), Wipro (-1.06%), TCS (-0.95%), L&T (-0.87%) and BHEL (-0.52%) were amongst the top losers.