Benchmarks were marching upwards after a shaky start Friday as buying activity resumed in oil&gas, banks and power stocks. However, second rung stocks were outperforming the frontliners.

Indian Markets are expected to open marginally lower, but could make an attempt to recover later during the day. Among the sectoral indices, Metals could correct today after yesterdays rise, while Oil & Gas & Power are looking good, said HDFC Securities report.

At 10:45 am, Bombay Stock Exchanges Sensex was at 17291.26, up 96.06 points or 0.56 per cent. The index touched an intra-day high of 17302.68 and low of 17126.55.

National Stock Exchange;s Nifty was at 5137.55, up 28.70 points or 0.56 per cent. The broader index hit a high of 5137.90 and low of 5093.20.

Markets are consolidating after two days of strong up-move. The trend is quite strong as leadership continues to be seen in banking and metal stocks which is keeping the momentum going. Even midcap and small cap stocks have shown buying interest in todays session which is keeping the market breadth strong.

The current trend has changed but caution has to be maintained at higher levels as huge sell-off cannot be ruled out. The strategy one should adopt is to buy at lower levels around the 5,070-5,040-5,015 keeping a trailing stop-loss of 4,980.

Buying should be on a selective basis above the 5,100 levels and strict stop-loss should be maintained to protect profits, said Nirmal Bang report.

BSE Midcap Index was up 0.88 per cent and BSE Smallcap Index gained 0.81 per cent.

Amongst the sectoral indices, BSE Bankex gained 1.25 per cent, BSE Oil&gas Index moved 1.15 per cent higher and BSE Power Index advanced 0.77 per cent.

BSE Metal Index was down 1.80 per cent and BSE FMCG Index declined 0.53 per cent.

State Bank of India (3.16%), Reliance Communications (2.25%), HDFC (1.54%), Reliance (1.51%) and Jaiprakash Associates (1.45%) were amongst the Sensex gainers.

Sterlite Industries (-6.21%), ITC (-1.11%), Tata Steel (-0.98%), Mahindra & Mahindra (-0.71%) and Tata Motors (-0.53%) were amongst the losers.

Shares of Sterlite Industries fell after the company said it raised $500 million in convertible senior notes and plans to use the proceeds for expansion of copper business. These notes are convertible into American depositary shares at $23.33 per share and carry a coupon of 4 per cent.

Market breadth was positive on the BSE with 1354 advances and 713 declines.

US stocks slipped on Thursday after Goldman Sachs and Citigroup reported quarterly results, but losses were limited after positive oil inventory data helped energy shares.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 12.47 points, or 0.12 per cent, to 10,003.24. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index fell 1.89 points, or 0.17 per cent, to 1,090.13. The Nasdaq Composite Index lost 7.60 points, or 0.35 per cent, to 2,166.61.

Asian markets were trading on a mixed note Friday tracking weak cues from Wall Street. The Nikkei rose 0.02 per cent and Hang Seng edged 0.12 per cent higher. Straits Times lost 0.28 per cent.