The index opened strong at 14,217.36 and rallied further to a high of 14,352.98 before concluding the day at 14,299.71, a sharp rise of 172.40 points.
MUMBAI: The benchmark Sensex on Thursday closed at its 3-month high of 14,299.71, up by 172 points, as shares continued their upward sprint following sharp rally in petrochem giant Reliance and firm global cues.
Heavyweight Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) was the most sought after stocks and closed with sharp gains of 3.09 per cent, keeping the bullish tempo upbeat for the second consecutive day.
The counter touched an all-time high of 1,688.15 during the trade, on the back of heavy buying after it struck natural gas in the Krishna-Godavari basin and Gujarat-Saurashtra basin on May 12.
Banking counters continued their north-bound journey on the passage of State Bank of India Subsidiary Bank (Amendment) Bill by the Lok Sabha and expectations of easing interest rates in anticipation of further fall in inflation.
The Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) 30-share sensitive index, Sensex, opened strong at 14,217.36 from Wednesday's close of 14,127.31 and rallied further to a high of 14,352.98 before concluding the day at 14,299.71, a sharp rise of 172.40 points or 1.22 per cent. Previously, the Sensex had closed at 14,402.90 on February 19.
The broad-based S&P CNX Nifty of the National Stock Exchange (NSE) touched a high of 4,232.45, just a few points away from an all-time peak of 4,245.30 logged on February 2.
It closed above 4200-mark at 3-1/2 month high of 4,219.55 from the previous close of 4,170.95, a smart rally of another 48.60 points or 1.17 per cent.
On Wall Street on Wednesday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average closed up by 103.69 points and Nasdaq Composite Index was up by 22.13 points, while most of the markets closed in the green in Asia on Thursday, barring Nikkei.
Domestic institutional investors continued their buying spree and they pumped nearly Rs 403.49 crore (provisional) on Wednesday, while foreign institutional investors (FIIs) sold shares worth Rs 245.15 crore (provisional).
Besides BSE-Auto index that closed in the red, other sectoral indices ended in the green.
Bajaj Auto fell sharply despite recommendation of a 400 per cent dividend for the year ended March 2007 and approval of demerger scheme.
Though the Sensex closed sharply higher, the market breadth was slightly negative, with 1,273 counters finishing up while 1,337 fell.
The trading volume shot up further to Rs 5,951.91 crore from Rs 5,178.52 crore on Wednesday. ICICI Bank -- FII deals - clocked the highest turnover of Rs 268.62 crore followed by Unitech (Rs 246.93 crore), Bhagwati Ban (Rs 205.20 crore), Bajaj Auto (Rs 178.81 crore) and RIL (Rs 164.95 crore).
The broad-based BSE-100 index shot up further by 89.78 points to 7,314.86 from previous close of 7,225.08.
The BSE-200 index and the Dollex-200 were quoted higher at 1,730.90 and 706.14 at close, compared to 1,711.17 and 697.32 previously. The BSE-500 index also improved further by 62.77 points to 5,529.10 from 5,466.33 and the Dollex-30 ended sharply up at 2,876.76 from 2,838.94 previously.
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