Equity indices edge higher, Tech Mahindra gains by 4.7 pc

Equity benchmark indices tracked their Asian peers and moved up during early hours on Friday.

At 10:15 am, the BSE S & P Sensex was up by 119 points at 36,764 while the Nifty 50 gained by 36 points to 10,884.

At the National Stock Exchange, most sectoral indices were in the green. But Nifty FMCG, pharma and realty were in the negative zone.

Among stocks, Tech Mahindra gained by 4.6 per cent to Rs 727.80 per share on signing a multi-year deal with AT & T. NTPC, UltraTech Cement, Axis Bank and Grasim were up by 1.3 to 1.6 per cent each.

However, Indiabulls Housing Finance fell by 5.4 per cent to Rs 423.59 per share. Sun Pharma, Yes Bank, Bharat Petroleum and Tata Consultancy Services too showed marginal losses.

Meanwhile, Asian stocks joined global peers and rose amid hopes for easing US-China trade tensions and as firm US economic data increased risk appetites.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan gained by 0.4 per cent. The Shanghai Composite Index was up by 0.2 per cent while Hong Kong's Hang Seng rose 0.6 per cent. South Korea's KOSPI climbed 0.3 per cent and Japan's Nikkei advanced 0.6 per cent.

Global equity markets welcomed news that the United States and China agreed on Thursday to hold high-level talks early in October, raising hopes for substantial progress in de-escalating their long, bitter trade conflict.

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