The sharemarket has opened flat after a day break mid-week, but soon made a marginal gain.

The Sensex is up 93.89 points at 29229.77 and the Nifty is up 25.80 points at 8835.15. About 771 shares have advanced, 276 shares declined, and 144 shares are unchanged. Coal India, ITC, HDFC, NTPC and HUL are top gainers in the Sensex.Among the losers are Hero, Sesa, Tata Motors, Bharti and Bajaj Auto. The Indian rupee opened flat at 62.20 per dollar against 62.16 Monday.

The euro rebounds helped by a bounce in German investor sentiment and hopes that Greece will find a common ground with its euro zone partners for support beyond its current bailout programme. Pramit Brahmbhatt of Veracity said, “Overnight US markets traded slightly strong and taking cues from this Asian markets which have also opened on a positive note. Though investors are expected to trade cautiously ahead of euro zone meeting.” Globally, US stocks ended higher after encouraging reports from Greece sent the S&P 500 to a record. Greece intends to ask for an extension of its loan agreement with the euro zone today.

Meanwhile, European stocks closed mixed as fears over Greece’s debt problems continued to make investors nervous. Asian markets, however, are smartly in the green with the Nikkei surging to new eight-year highs as the yen weakened to 119.1. Trading volumes in Asia will be light ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday. Singapore, Malaysia markets will be open for half a day while China, Taiwan and South Korea will be shut today. In commodities, Brent Crude hit a 2015 high of USD 63 per barrel in trade on Tuesday. It is currently trading at around USD 62 per barrel.

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