Equity benchmark Sensex rallied 347 points to end at its fresh lifetime peak on Monday, tracking gains in index majors HDFC, HUL and ICICI Bank amid unabated foreign fund inflows.
After touching a record intra-day high of 45,458.92, the 30-share BSE index settled 347.42 points or 0.77 per cent higher at 45,426.97.
Similarly, the broader NSE Nifty rose 97.20 points or 0.73 per cent to an all-time closing high of 13,355.75. It touched its record intra-day peak of 13,366.65 in early trade.
Bharti Airtel was the top gainer in the Sensex pack, rising around 3 per cent, followed by HUL, HDFC, ITC, IndusInd Bank, SBI, Sun Pharma, ONGC, Tech Mahindra, L&T and Asian Paints.
On the other hand, Kotak Bank, Nestle India, Tata Steel, Bajaj Finance and HDFC Bank were among the laggards.
“Domestic equities remained resilient and defied the weak global markets,” said Binod Modi, Head-Strategy at Reliance Securities.
Strong buying was seen across the pack towards the end of the day and thus Nifty gained for the fifth consecutive day. Volatility index once again declined reflecting little risk of ongoing rally, he added.
“Positive progress on COVID-19 vaccination and RBI’s strong commitment to support economy recovery are supporting market rally. Further, increased visibility of fiscal stimulus in the US with weak dollar may continue to attract FPIs into emerging markets including India,” he stated.
Elsewhere in Asia, bourses in Shanghai, Hong Kong and Tokyo ended in the red, while Seoul finished with gains.
Stock exchanges in Europe were largely trading with losses in early deals.
Meanwhile, the global oil benchmark Brent crude futures slipped 1.02 per cent to USD 48.75 per barrel.
Nifty call:
Strategy: Buy on dips with a fixed stop-loss
Supports: 13,350 and 13,300
Resistances: 13,400 and 13,430
Rupee call:
The rupee looks clearly bullish and this is corroborated by the weakness in dollar as indicated by the dollar index. However, 73.70 is a considerable resistance. Hence, traders can wait for now and buy INR if it rallies past the hurdle at 73.70 and place a tight stop-loss.
Supports: 73.85 and 74.00
Resistances: 73.70 and 73.50
Update:
Shares hit record highs on Monday, led by gains in Oil and Natural Gas Corp Ltd after the company made a “significant” discovery in South America, although losses in top private sector lender HDFC Bank capped gains.
The NSE Nifty 50 index rose 0.19 per cent to 13,283.15 by 0354 GMT, while the benchmark S&P BSE Sensex was up 0.17 per cent at 45,157.33. Both indexes had registered five straight weeks of gains amid news of progress in coronavirus vaccines.
ONGC climbed 4.6 per cent to its highest since early March after it said on Friday its overseas arm made a “significant strike of oil” in its block in Colombia.
Pfizer's Indian arm rose as much as 2.5 per cent in early trade after a top government health adviser said the US drugmaker had applied for emergency use authorisation of its Covid-19 vaccine in India.
HDFC Bank Ltd dropped 1.8 per cent to its lowest since mid-November and was the biggest drag on the indexes.
The Reserve Bank of India on Thursday halted the lender from sourcing new credit card customers and launching digital businesses due to outages in bank's internet banking, mobile banking, payment utilities.
Meanwhile, Asian peers were trading lower after Reuters reported that the United States was preparing to impose sanctions on some Chinese officials over their alleged role in Beijing's disqualification of elected opposition legislators in Hong Kong. (Reuters)
Opening bell:
Sensex rises 84.62 points to 45,164.17 in opening session; Nifty advances 25.30 points to 13,283.85