The Sensex is down 31.53 points at 21888.26, and the Nifty is down 7.20 points at 6519.45. About 1206 shares have advanced, 1128 shares declined, and 149 shares are unchanged. BHEL and SBI are up 3 percent each while Tata Motors falls 3 percent.

The exuberance seen in the current market rally is clearly on back of the hope that India will have a stable new government says Ajay Bodke, Prabhudas Lilladher in an interview to CNBC-TV18. However, he advises investors to be cautious because of the sheer ferocity with which the market has already scaled highs.

He thinks in fair value terms 6850 on Nifty looks possible but reiterates that one needs to be cautious. He recommends buying on dips as a strategy. According to him one should clearly watch out for the forthcoming events of the week that is the Crimean referendum on March 16 and Index of Industrial Production numbers that are slated to come out later in the week, which could be a disappointing for the month of January.

According to him one should clearly watch out for the forthcoming events of the week that is the Crimean referendum on March 16 and Index of Industrial Production numbers that are slated to come out later in the week, which could be a disappointing for the month of January.

Tata Power is in focus today. The electric utility company will issue 33.2 crore shares via rights issue at Rs 60 per share. Eligible shareholders will be entitled for 7 shares for every 50 shares.

Maury Harris, MD & Chief Economist-America, UBS Investment Research expects the US Federal Reserve to continue its USD 10 billion taper programme. “An increase in non-farm payroll is a very healthy increase considering that we had unusually bad weather in the month of February,??? he told CNBC-TV18. Harris, who has a year-end target of 1,950 on the S&P 500, expects the emerging markets to outperform their developed peers in the next one or two years.

The sharemarket has gone quiet with active buying seen in select stocks. The Sensex is down 2.56 points at 21917.23, and the Nifty is up 0.75 points at 6527.40. About 1194 shares have advanced, 1053 shares declined, and 151 shares are unchanged. BHEL is up 3 percent, while SBI, L&T and Reliance are up 2 percent each.

Tata Motors, TCS and Hindalco lose 2 percent each. The rupee weakened against the dollar tracking Asian currencies. Dollar demand from oil importers also weighed and government bond prices fell today as the weakness in the rupee weighed and on better-than-expected US non farm payroll data.