Mumbai– Broadly positive global cues along with healthy buying in banking stocks helped the key Indian equity indices to set fresh benchmarks on Monday.
Before settling at record closing levels, both S&P BSE Sensex and the NSE Nifty50 had touched their all-time intra-day highs of 37,805.25 points and 11,427.65 points respectively.
However, weakness in the Indian rupee limited the gains in the market, analysts said.
Index-wise, the wider Nifty50 on the National Stock Exchange closed 11,387.10 points, higher by 26.30 points or 0.23 per cent from its previous close.
The BSE Sensex, which had opened at 37,714.70 points, closed at 37,691.89 points — higher by 135.73 points or 0.36 per cent — from its previous close of 37,556.16 points. It touched an intra-day low of 37,643.29 points.
In the broader markets, the S&P BSE mid-cap rose by 0.26 points and the S&P BSE small-cap ended 0.39 per cent from its previous close. The BSE market breadth was bullish with 1,591 advances against 1,145 declines.
“Markets in India saw a gap-up opening on positive Asian stocks and traded firm through the day,” said Abhijeet Dey, Senior Fund Manager for Equities at BNP Paribas Mutual Fund.
On the currency front, the rupee closed at 68.89, weakened by 28 paise from the previous close of 68.61 per dollar.
Investment-wise, provisional data with exchanges showed that foreign institutional investors bought scrip worth Rs 248.70 crore and the domestic institutional investors purchased stocks worth Rs 218.64 crore.
Sector-wise, the S&P BSE banking index rose by 344.18 points, the auto index was up 99.70 points and the metal index ended higher by 98.65 points.
On the contrary, the S&P BSE healthcare declined by 61.39 points, followed by the FMCG index which was down 41.32 points and the IT index which ended lower by 34.37 points.
The major gainers on the Sensex were Axis Bank, up 3.86 per cent at Rs 596.50; ICICI Bank, up 3.36 per cent at Rs 315.05; State Bank of India, up 3.33 per cent at Rs 308.55; Bharti Airtel, up 3.07 per cent at Rs 386.20; and Hero MotoCorp, up 1.57 per cent from Rs 3,296.95 per share.
The major losers were Kotak Mahindra Bank, down 2.05 per cent at Rs 1,282.35; Hindustan Unilever, down 1.65 per cent at Rs 1,730.50; Sun Pharma, up 1.58 per cent at Rs 575.60; Tata Motors, down 1.57 per cent at Rs 254.70; and Tata Motors (DVR), down 1.37 per cent at Rs 140.70 per share. (IANS)
