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| Sensex hits 16-month high, Nifty crosses 4,900 |
| BS Reporter / Mumbai Sep 17, 2009, 00:44 IST |
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Strong global cues, good advance tax numbers and hopes of better Q2 results add to the rally.
Both the benchmark indices, the Sensex and the Nifty, On Wednesday closed at their 16-month highs as hopes of a global economic recovery became stronger. The rally was also aided by positive domestic sentiments coupled with hopes of strong quarterly numbers and liquidity flows.
Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Governor D Subbarao’s comment that the central bank would not hike interest rates until the economy was firmly on track, also contributed to the rally.
Yesterday, the US markets rose on strong manufacturing and retail sales data and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S Bernanke’s statement that the worst recession since the 1930s had probably ended.
The Nasdaq Composite Index added 0.54 per cent and the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 0.59 per cent.
The Sensex On Wednesday opened 44 points up at 16,498.59 and soared to a high of 16,700.56 towards the end of the session on strong metal stocks.
The Sensex finally ended at 16,677.04, up 222.59 points, or 1.35 per cent. The S&P CNX Nifty crossed the 4,900-mark and closed at 4,958.40, up 66.30 points, or 1.36 per cent.
All the sectors ended positive with the metal index leading the surge with a 4.20 per cent gain. The other major gainers among sectoral indices were Auto (2.23 per cent), Consumer Durables (2.17 per cent), Bankex (1.99 per cent), Realty (1.80 per cent), Information Technology (1.45 per cent) and TECk (1.34 per cent).
Among the BSE-30 stocks, Tata Steel zoomed 8.21 per cent on brightening growth prospects of its UK arm Corus. Some of the other prominent movers were Tata Motors (6.22 per cent), Hindalco (4.96 per cent), State Bank of India (4 per cent), Sterlite (3.71 per cent) and Hero Honda (3.65 per cent). ACC, Grasim Industries, ICICI Bank, Reliance Communications and Infosys added 2-3 per cent each.
Hindustan Unilever, Wipro, Reliance Infrastructure, HDFC, ONGC and TCS lost below 1 per cent each. The market breadth was positive. Out of 2,882 shares traded, 1,575 advanced, 1,243 declined and 64 remained unchanged on BSE.
“The surge can be attributed to many positive factors like strong foreign institutional investor (FII) flows, heavy buying in banking stocks, specially those of public sector banks, and the strong advance tax numbers that indicate good second-quarter results,” said Amitabh Chakraborty, head (equities), Religare Securities.
The Asian markets also moved to their highest levels in 2009 On Wednesday after a firm US economic data boosted riskier assets. The Hang Seng advanced 2.57 per cent and the Seoul Composite Index was up 1.81 per cent. The Straits Times and the Taiwan Weighted Index were up over 1 per cent each.
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