Sensex gains 222 points, Cipla and ICICI Bank top gainers

Equity benchmark indices erased early losses and made a dramatic recovery in the afternoon trade on Wednesday due to heavy buying in metal, banking and realty stocks.

The BSE S & P Sensex closed 222 points or 0.55 per cent higher at 40,470 while the Nifty 50 moved up by 44 points to 11,961. Most sectoral indices at the National Stock Exchange were in the green except for Nifty auto, PSU bank and media.

Nifty realty ticked up by 2.3 per cent, private bank by 1.4 per cent, financial service by 1.1 per cent and metal by 0.4 per cent.

Among stocks, private lenders gained with ICICI Bank up by 2.5 per cent, IndusInd Bank by 1.8 per cent and HDFC Bank by 1.3 per cent. Pharma majors Cipla and Dr Reddy's edged higher by 3 per cent and 1.6 per cent, respectively.

Shares of Infosys closed 2.3 per cent higher after Co-Founder and Chairman Nandan Nilekani condemned mischievous insinuations made by anonymous sources against the co-founders and former colleagues, suggesting their involvement in the recent whistleblower allegations.

However, Titan tumbled down by 10 per cent to close at Rs 1,154.30 per share after reporting subdued Q2 results. The other losers were Bharti Airtel, ONGC, Bajaj Finserv and Maruti Suzuki.

Meanwhile, Asian shares were little changed as investors awaited new developments toward scaling back a protracted trade war between the United States and China.

Japan's Nikkei stock index rose by 0.22 per cent, Hong Kong's Hang Seng by 0.02 per cent and South Korea's Kospi by 0.07 per cent.

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