The key benchmark indices were flat in early trades on Friday. The benchmark Sensex rose 80 points to 15,861 levels and the Nifty was up 20 points at 4,707.

Buying interest was seen in realty, capital goods and banking stocks. On the sectoral front, the realty index on the BSE gained 1 per cent and the capital goods index rose 0.8 per cent. The BSE banking index was up 0.7 per cent.

Among the Sensex stocks, Bharti Airtel led the gainers. The stock advanced 1.4 per cent. ICICI Bank, Maruti Suzuki and BHEL were the other main gainers in the pack, up more than 1.2 per cent each.

Sun Pharma, however, was the top loser. The stock fell 2.5 per cent.

In US markets, major indices overcame early losses on Thursday and finished slightly higher, including the Dow Jones industrial average, which added 37 points to set a fresh 2009 high. The Standard & Poor's 500 index rose 2.86, or 0.3 percent, to 1,030.98, while the Nasdaq composite index rose 3.30, or 0.2 percent, to 2,027.73.

Asian markets, however, were trading mixed today. South Koreas Kospi and Japans Nikkei were up over 0.3 per cent each. Hong Kongs Hang Seng was down 0.5 per cent while Chinas Shanghai Composite slipped 2.4 per cent.