Sensex crosses 20,000-peak after two years; closes a tad lower

The BSE benchmark Sensex on Tuesday breached the 20,000-level after two years but settled a tad lower at 19,986.82, still over 80 points higher, amid strong buying on rate cut hopes and signs of robust earnings from corporates in December quarter.

After crossing 20,000 points level in early trade and again for a second time in the last hour, the Sensex closed with a gain 80.41 points, or 0.40%, at 19,986.82.

This was the first time since January 6, 2011 that the index crossed the 20,000-mark.

Buying was seen mainly in blue-chip stocks like ITC, Bharti Airtel, ICICI Bank, Tata Motors and ONGC, that contributed the most to Sensex rise. However, profit booking in counters like Infosys, CIL, SBI and Sterlite capped gains.

Bharti Airtel, which rose 4.81%, was the best performer in Sensex on Tuesday on hopes of tariff hikes.

While the sentiment was buoyant on good set of numbers from Tata Consultancy Services, HCL Tech and Axis Bank, lack of direction due to global markets closing narrowly mixed did not help Indian markets, experts said.

The NSE Nifty closed with a gain of 32.55 points, or 0.54%, at 6,056.60, after touching day's high of 6,068.50.

Stocks of rate-sensitive banking, realty and auto sectors were in limelight on heightened expectations of a rate cut. The RBI meets on January 29 to review its monetary policy.

"It was another strong day for the markets with the Sensex crossing the 20000 mark during the day. Strong results from companies so far have buoyed the sentiments of market," said Dipen Shah, Head of PCG Research, Kotak Securities.

On Monday, Sensex had spurted by 242.77 points after postponement of the implementation of controversial GAAR by two years until April 2016 and fall in inflation (WPI) to 3-year low.