Mumbai: Equity benchmark indices see-sawed between gains and losses during early hours on Monday while Asian markets were flat due to weak volumes ahead of the Christmas holiday break. At 10:15 am, the BSE S&P Sensex was down by 38 points to 41,643 while the Nifty 50 was up by 3 points at 12,277. Most sectoral indices at the National Stock Exchange were in the green except for Nifty PSU bank.

Nifty metal and media gained by 0.7 per cent each. Among stocks, index heavyweight Reliance Industries slipped by 2.08 per cent to trade at Rs 1,565.80 per share. The others in negative zone included Coal India, Nestle India, HDFC Bank and Adani Ports. However, UPL was up by 2.7 per cent, Zee Entertainment by 2.5 per cent, Bharat Petroleum Corporation by 1.9 per cent, JSW Steel and Vedanta by 1.6 per cent each.

Meanwhile, Asian stock markets were steady on trade optimism between the United States and China. Reports said US President Donald Trump had a good talk with China's leader Xi Jinping about phase one of the trade deal they struck recently. But volumes weakened ahead of the Christmas holiday break and investors squared off their positions.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia Pacific shares outside Japan was steady after rising 1.4 per cent last week. Japan's Nikkei climbed by 0.1 per cent but South Korea's market was a shade weaker after adding 5.5 per cent so far in December.