Sensex crosses 26,000 mark on firm buying

The benchmark BSE Sensex today rallied to revisit the psychological 26,000-mark in morning deals on firm buying in key sectors such as FMCG, consumer durables, healthcare, teck, IT, power, oil & gas and banking.
Encouraging Q1 earnings, increased FII buying and positive global cues continued to bolster investor sentiments.
The 30-share index Sensex opened higher at 25,948.30 and traded between 26,071.52 and 25,945.35 before quoting at 26,037.91 at 1010 hours.
It showed a gain of 118.96 points, or 0.46 per cent, from its last close.
The NSE 50-share barometer Nifty also rose by 23.60 points, or 0.30 per cent, to 7,763.15 at 1010 hours.

Major gainers were HDFC Bank 1.95 pct, Hindalco 1.64 pct, GAIL 1.45 pct, SunPharma 1.22 pct, TCS 1.16 pct, ICICI Bank 1.14 pct and M&M 1.12 pct.

Asian stocks were trading higher as a slowdown in the US retail sales fuelled bets that the US Federal Reserve won't raise interest rates earlier than expected.
Key benchmark indices in Taiwan, Japan, Singapore, Indonesia and South Korea rose by 0.14 to 0.53 per cent; while key indices in China and Hong Kong fell 0.06 to 0.12 per cent.
Meanwhile, Foreign Portfolio Investors (FPIs) bought shares worth a net Rs 718.27 crore yesterday, as per provisional data from the stock exchanges.