- At 9:34 am, the BSE Sensex was trading 116 points higher at 35,324 while the Nifty was up 21 points at 10,736.
- Besides ICICI Bank, other top gainers on the Nifty 50 included Lupin, Cipla, Coal India and Eicher Motors, trading more than 1 per cent higher each.
- Pharma stocks rose, with the NSE sectoral index - Nifty Pharma - trading 1 per cent higher in morning deals.
- Among other pharma shares, Dr Reddy's Laboratories was up 1 per cent and Sun Pharma up 0.7 per cent.
- ICICI Bank had on Monday reported that its net profit for January-March almost halved to Rs 1,020 crore. On bad loans, ICICI's long-serving Chief Executive Chanda Kochhar, said the focus was turning to recovery and resolution and the bank would aim to lower its net non-performing loan ratio to 1.5 per cent in two years from 4.77 per cent at the end of March. "We believe that since a lot of the stress has already been recognised, going forward, in fact, our focus will be on recovery and resolution," she said.
- The rupee traded in the range of 67.20-67.14 against dollar in morning deals. It had closed at a 15-month low of 67.13 against the US dollar on Monday.
- Global crude oil prices stood near their highest since late 2014, ahead of an announcement by US President Donald Trump on whether he would withdraw from a landmark nuclear deal with Iran, which fuelled concerns about crude supply.
- While caution on Mr Trump's statement kept many investors on edge, Asian shares made small gains, led by technology firms.
- Shares in other Asian markets firmed slightly. MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan gained 0.2 per cent, with information technology shares rising 0.4 per cent. Japan's Nikkei was almost flat.
- Overnight on Wall Street, the S&P 500 gained 0.35 per cent, boosted by Apple's sixth straight day of gains.
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(With agency inputs)
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