Indian equities continued to rise in early trade for the third day on Monday. Banks, auto and financial stocks witnessed buying interest while IT and pharma stocks declined.

The 30-share benchmark index, BSE Sensex opened with a gain of 110.29 points or 0.18% at 60,158.76, while the broad based NSE Nifty started with a rise of 79.00 points or 0.44%, at 17,932.20.

At 10.02 a.m., the Sensex was trading up 99.07 points or 0.16% at 60,147.54 with 10 components falling.  Meanwhile, the Nifty was trading higher by 33.90 points or 0.19% at 17,887.10 with 31 components gaining.  

Major gainers in the 30-share index were Maruti Suzuki (2.94%), ONGC (2.28%), Mahindra & Mahindra  (2.03%), HDFC Bank (1.64%), State Bank of India (1.33%), Bajaj Auto (1.15%), Axis Bank (1.04%), ICICI Bank (0.94%) and Reliance Industries (0.73%).

On the other hand, Tech Mahindra (2.11%), HCL Technologies (1.86%), Infosys (1.15%), Bajaj Finserv (1.08%), ITC (0.71%), TCS (0.66%), Nestle (0.52%), Bajaj Finance (0.41%) and Titan (0.32%) were the major losers in the Sensex.

On global front, Asian stocks edged up at the open on Monday with traders keeping an eye on China Evergrande Group’s debt crisis. Shares had modest gains in Japan, where the ruling coalition chooses a new leader this week who will probably be the next prime minister. Australia also rose, while South Korea was little changed.

U.S. futures advanced. Solid economic recovery and sustained growth in the next couple of years will be positive for the market sentiment. Moreover strong retail participation, both local and foreign fund buying interest will be boost market sentiment. Friday, FIIs were  net buyers Rs 4,420 million while DIIs were net sellers Rs 5,160 million. Both, Dow Future and SGX Nifty gained nearly half percent each. Wall Street stocks finished a volatile week on a muted note on Friday as markets monitored ongoing travails around Evergrande and rising supply chain concerns following disappointing Nike results. Both Dow and S&P 500 gained 0.1% each. US 10-Year Bond gained 2bps to close at 1.45%.

European stock markets closed in negative territory on Friday ahead of German elections this weekend and as traders continued to track developments surrounding China's embattled property company, Evergrande. Both France and Germany Index slipped 1% each while UK Index shed 0.4%.