Markets have a robust closing

The bulls came back with a bang after being at the receiving end in the past four sessions and sidelined for a greater part of last month. The Sensex extended the intra-day rebound of the previous session and reclaim the 18k mark to end at 18205, higher by 234 points and Nifty ended at 5471, up 69 points. The midcap index ended at 7723, higher by 127 points and the smallcap index ended at 9712, up 172 points.

The key benchmark indices had begun the day on a firm note, tracking the decent gains across Asia. The Hang Seng and Nikkei had gained in the region of about half a percent each in early trades, what with the Dow maintaining its head above 10k to end flat at 10,014 overnight. After trading in a stable manner all through the morning session, the markets back home got a fillip around noon as the European markets began on a cheerful note and trading in US futures suggests a decent start to the proceedings on Wall Street. The FTSE, CAC and DAX have gained between 1% and 2% each in mid-day trades and the Dow seems headed to open higher by about half a per cent.  

The day clearly belonged to telecom, metal, realty and PSU stocks. Reliance Communication raced ahead by 4.9% to Rs 163 to top the gainers list on the BSE as the 3G spectrum allocation reportedly starts today. RCom had lost 3.6% in the previous session and has been on a downhill since caressing the Rs 200 levels more than a month ago. The 3G auction was held in April-May this year and the government earned revenues of over Rs 67,000 crore. Among the other telecom peers, Bharti Airtel gained 3.1% at Rs 337, Idea Cellular added 0.9% at Rs 72 and Tata Teleservices (Maharashtra) added 1.7% at Rs 22.

Metal stocks reversed Tuesday's decline and thereby broke out of the consolidation mode due to bargain hunting at lower levels. Hindalco strengthened by 4.4% at Rs 173, Sterlite gained 3.5% at Rs 156 and Tata Steel added 2.9% at Rs 537.

In the realty pack, DLF gained 2.5% at Rs 309, Indiabulls Real Estate added 3.6% at Rs 174 and Unitech added 3.2% at Rs 80.

The shares of public sector undertakings (PSUs) were in the limelight on renewed hopes of disinvestment proceedings. Hindustan Copper, the largest gainer among PSU pack, soared by 17.6% to Rs 465. The government has already approved the sale of 10% stake plus 10% fresh equity in the company and is aiming to mobilize around Rs 4,000 crore through disinvestment. State Trading Corporation (STC) zoomed by 13% at Rs 420, MMTC gained 4.5% at Rs 1373 and NMDC added 4% at Rs 250.

And RIL broke its 7-day losing streak to end at Rs 936, higher by 1.9%, on the BSE.

Among the stocks to buck the strong trend, Hero Honda weakened by 1.8% at Rs 1758, HDFC gained by 0.4% at Rs 622 and ONGC lost 0.3% at Rs 1333.

The market breath was strong. Out of 3064 stocks traded on the BSE, there were 2203 advancing stocks as against 749 declines.