Buy banks, sell IT stocks today: Sanjeev Bhasin

Strong global cues could see Nifty head higher & touch the 6,600 mark on Tuesday. Strong foreign flows and rupee's outperformance are likely to support the indices.

Weakness in oil & gold overnight and return of risk could see Bank Nifty outperform. With inflation falling and RBI monitoring the bond market, expect yields to fall which could improve MTM (mark to market) gains for banks.

For today, a pair trade involving long Bank Nifty and short CNX IT could make money. The other strategy would be to be bullish in cyclicals like banks, capital goods & auto, while shorting IT, pharma & FMCG which seem to have lost their mojo.

Trading calls for today:

Longs:

1. Buy Bank Nifty: 12055, stop loss 11867, target 12455

2. Buy Maruti: 1720, stop loss 1690, target 1790

3. Buy HDFC: 852, stop loss 843, target 895

4. Buy ICICI bank: 1215, stop loss 1182, target 1276

Shorts:

1. Sell CNX IT: 9450, stop loss9545, target 9175

2. Sell Infosys: 3400, stop loss 3465, target 3300

3. Sell Sun Pharma: 585, stop loss 612, target 522

4. Sell HCL Tech: 1425, stop loss 1455, target 1360

Investment call:

Buy Exide Industries: 116, 3-month target 170 (Why: Market leader in car & industrial battery market. Has seen sharp fall in lead prices which is key ingredient & which would see margins expand. Also, with auto sales now having bottomed out, expect volumes to grow in coming quarter).