The key Indian equity markets traded in the positive territory on Thursday afternoon tracking strong cues from the Asian markets.
Heavy buying in the metal, IT and capital goods stocks also helped the market sentiment to remain positive.
So far, the S&P BSE metal index surged around 558.59 points, followed by the IT stocks which edged up by 125.58 points and capital goods stocks, by 120.60 points.
At 1.20 p.m., the wider Nifty50 on the National Stock Exchange (NSE) traded higher by 33.40 points or 0.32 per cent at 10,559.60 points.
The barometer 30-scrip Sensitive Index (Sensex) of the BSE, which opened at 34,403.67 points, traded at 34,412.41 points (1.20 p.m.) -- up 80.73 points or 0.24 per cent from its previous session's close.
The Sensex has so far touched a high of 34,478.82 points and a low of 34,358.91 during the intra-day trade.
The BSE market breadth was bullish with 1,265 advances and 1,082 declines.
"Markets gained in early morning trade as global Asian indices traded in green, following the US markets which closed with one per cent up-move," said Dhruv Desai, Director and Chief Operating Officer of Tradebulls.
On Wednesday, profit booking, along with heavy selling pressure in the banking sector stock, led the key Indian equity indices to break their nine-day gaining streak and end in red.
The Nifty50 fell by 22.50 points or 0.21 per cent to close at 10,526.20 points on Wednesday, and the Sensex closed at 34,331.68 points -- down 63.38 points or 0.18 per cent.
On Thursday, the major gainers on the BSE were Tata Steel, Yes Bank, Bharti Airtel, Tata Consultancy Services and ONGC while Axis Bank, HDFC, Sun Pharma, Coal India and ICICI Bank were among the top losers.
On NSE, the top gainers were Hindalco, Vedanta and Tata Steel and major losers were BPCL, Hindustan Petroleum and Indian Oil Corp.
--IANS
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