9)0AM Merger activity boosted pre-market sentiment.

U.S. stock futures were indicating a positive opening on Tuesday after a three-day weekend. Pre-market sentiment was lifted by merger activity, including a $95.5 billion hostile bid for ABN Amro (ABN: chart) from a group led by Royal Bank of Scotland. In other deal news, Archstone-Smith (ASN: chart) is close to a $20 billion acquisition by Tishman Speyer and Lehman Brothers (LEH: chart). URS Corp. (URS: chart) agreed to buy engineering and design company Washington Group (WNG: chart) for $2.6 B in cash and stock.

In earnings news, Vodafone Group (VOD: chart) announced narrower full-year loss due to cost cutting and strong growth in emerging markets. On the economic agenda, the Conference Board is due to report its May index of consumer confidence, while Standard & Poor's is expected to release its home price index. The futures contact for the Dow Jones Industrial Average last was up 25 points at 13,552. The futures contract for the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq 100 last were 3 points higher at 1,520.30 and up 2.5 points at 1,895.5.


8:30AM Royal Bank of Scotland made a hostile bid for ABN Amro.

A consortium led by Royal Bank of Scotland PLC (RBS: chart) announced on Tuesday an agreement to make a hostile bid of 71.1 billion euros ($95.5 billion) for ABN Amro (ABN: chart), outbidding a friendly offer from Barclays PLC. The group offered 11% more cash compared to an earlier bid of 27.30 euros a share, and in total the improved bid was worth more than the all-stock offer from Barclays. RBS, Santander and Fortis offered 30.40 euros in cash and 0.844 RBS share for each ABN Amro share, valuing the Dutch bank at 38.40 euros a share.

The banks said that they made the offer on the condition that ABN Amro shareholders would reject the company''s proposed sale of its LaSalle Bank division to Bank of America (BAC: chart) for $21.5 billion. ABN Amro''s shares fell 0.6%, shares of RBS fell 1.1%, while Barclays shares rose 0.8%.


7:30AM NY-6:30PM Mumbai Sensex rallies Tuesday on strong Reliance Industries.

The Sensex finished 110.32 points, or 0.77%, higher at 14,508.21.

The market-breadth was positive as 1,357 stocks advanced, while 1,213 stocks declined and only 102 stocks remained unchanged. Of the 30 stocks in the Sensex, 22 advanced, while the rest declined, The turnover on BSE was Rs 4,573 crore, slightly higher than Rs 4,241 crore on Monday. On NSE, the turnover was Rs 9,340.58 crore, almost unchanged from Rs 9,320.08 crore on Monday.

Economic news

The government today announced that it was considering a scheme to refund the local taxes and levies to labor-intensive industries with little import component to counter the impact of the soaring rupee, which hit a nine-year high yesterday.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, concerned about the slowdown of the agriculture sector, has told the Chief Ministers that the government is willing to support their plans for enhancing productivity in the segment.

The annual monsoon rains, vital for the economy of the country, hit Kerala, four days ahead of the normal date of June 1.

Trading highlights

Orbit Corp was the most-active stock with a turnover of Rs 208.40 crore followed by Unitech and Reliance Industries. New issue, real estate company Orbit Corporation, surged 15.13% to Rs 252.60 on huge volumes of 84.38 lakh shares.

Advancers

BHEL and Cipla soared nearly 5% each to Rs 2,856 and Rs 219, respectively. Pharmaceutical large-cap Cipla was in focus today and enjoyed strong buying momentum, after it was hit in the past few weeks, for posting poor fourth-quarter fiscal 2007 results. BHEL had struck a record high of Rs 2,889.90 in intra-day trade. The company had reported 32.54% increase in net profit in the fourth-quarter of fiscal 2007 to Rs 1,150.37 crore from Rs 867.95 crore in the comparable period a year earlier, after trading hours on May 25 2007.

Larsen & Toubro surged 4% to Rs 1,857. L&T reported 50% rise in net profit in fourth-quarter of fiscal 2007 to Rs 701 crore from Rs 467 crore a year earlier. Ranbaxy and Reliance Communications rallied over 2% each to Rs 390 and Rs 521, respectively. Ranbaxy Laboratories, the wholly owned subsidiary of Ranbaxy Laboratories, acquired the US rights to a group of 13 dermatology brands from Bristol-Myers Squibb Co for $26 million on Monday, May 28 2007.