Sensex rallies 200pts

Northbound journey continues, the Sensex has now rallied nearly 200 points to 20,209. The NSE Nifty is up 52 points at 6048.
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(Updated at 1245 hrs)

The markets have extended gains in the last hour of trades. The Sensex is now up 159 points at 20,084. The NSE Nifty has added 44 points at 6040.

Metal and banking stocks are leading the gains, the BSE Metal index and Bankex have advanced over 1% each at 17,293 and 13,109, respectively.

Jindal Saw Pipes, SAIL, Sterlite and Hindustan Zinc are the major gainers among the Sensex stocks - up around 2% each. Bhushan Steel, Hindalco, Jindal Steel and Tata Steel are the other prominent gainers.

From the banking pack, HDFC Bank, Axis Bank, Bank of India, Canara Bank, IndusInd Bank, Union Bank and Yes Bank are the top gainers.

The market breadth is fairly positive - out of 2,881 stocks traded so far, 1,877 have advanced, and 895 have declined on the BSE.

Hindalco is the top gainer among the Sensex 30 stocks. HDFC, Sterlite, Jindal Steel, Tata Steel and HDFC Bank are the other major gainers. On the other hand, Wipro and Tata Motors are the prominent losers.