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The Bombay Stock Exchange Reuters
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Ushering in the festive season, the BSE benchmark Sensex today jumped by 133 points to a 31-month high on persistent FII inflows and firm European cues.
Rising for the fourth session in a row, the Bombay Stock Exchange's 30-share index closed with a gain of 132.95 points, or 0.71%, at 18,799.66.
This marks its best close since January 18, 2008, when it settled at 19,013.70.
The wide-based 50-share Nifty index of the National Stock Exchange increased by 0.57 per cent to finish at 5,640.05.
"Markets extended gains ahead of Ramzan Eid and Ganesh Chaturthi over the weekend. In addition, global cues acted as a sentiment booster on Dalal Street," IIFL Vice-President (Research) Amar Ambani said.
On a weekly basis, the Sensex recorded a gain of 3.17%. Despite mixed cues from global peers, Indian markets traded with a positive bias throughout the week.
Stock markets will remain closed tomorrow on the occasion of the Eid-ul-Fitr festival.
Barring oil & gas and pharma, all the sectoral indices on the BSE ended in the green, with financial, consumer goods and PSU stocks leading the gains.
It was another day when banking heavyweights like SBI, HDFC Bank and ICICI Bank led from the front. SBI zoomed 3%, HDFC Bank 2.67% and ICICI Bank 1.48%.
With a jump of 3.16%t, M&M was the top gainer in the Sensex pack. L&T rose nearly 1% and DLF 1.29%.
"Markets are doing well on the back of relentless inflow from overseas fund houses, which are bullish on India's growth story," Unicon Financial CEO Gajendra Nagpal said.
IT bellwether Infosys continued its upward journey and closed 0.67% higher. Tata Steel rose 2.38%, BHEL 1.76%, Hero Honda 1.54%, NTPC 1.45% and HUL 1.33%.
"Indian stock markets have so far displayed resilience to news flow pertaining to the global economic slowdown and sovereign debt concerns," brokerage house Reliance Securities said in a note.
"However, there is a possibility of heightened volatility that may creep into domestic markets in these uncertain global times," it added.
Reliance Industries, which holds the highest weightage in the Sensex, lagged behind and ended 0.22% lower at Rs957.95.
Cipla sank 1.68% and was the biggest loser in the index. Other major losers were Tata Motors, which declined by 1.58%, while R-Infra fell by 1.30% and ACC by 1.13%.
Analysts said the markets ignored rising food inflation, as investors are confident it will come down in the coming period on the back of a good monsoon.
Food inflation increased to 11.47% for the week ended August 28, rising for the second consecutive week, fuelling fears that the Reserve Bank will hike policy rates at its meeting on September 16.
Of the 30 Sensex stocks, 18 ended with gains, while 12 closed in the red.
The sentiment on Dalal Street was also upbeat after the successful placement of debt worth USD 1.3 billion by Portugal eased concerns about sovereign default in Europe.
Asian stocks ended mixed. Japan's benchmark Nikkei closed 0.82% higher, while China's Shanghai index declined by 1.44%.
The investor sentiment was upbeat after Australian employers added more workers than estimated and an improving appetite for European government debt eased concerns over the region's budget deficit crisis, brokerage house SMC said.
Wall Street rose on Wednesday as investors latched on to positive news coming out of Europe.
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