Sensex hits record high on second day; up 36 pts

The BSE benchmark Sensex today scaled a new high of 21,373.66 today by gaining 36 points on buying in select stocks in an otherwise lacklustre trade.
This is for the second successive day that the key index is hitting record high level. Yesterday, the barometer rose by 87 points to close at all-time high of 21,337.67.
A smart rise in heavyweights like L&T, HDFC, Infosys, Axis Bank, Sun Pharma, ITC, Bharati Airtel and GAIL India helped the Sensex to log its historical closing high and extent gains for the fourth straight trading day in a row.
The 30-issue bellwether index initially dipped to a low of 21,264.71 on weak Asian cues, but gradually recovered after mid-session and crossed 21,400-mark.

It was just 74 points short of its life-time intra-day high of 21,483.74, recorded on December 9, 2013.
Finally, the Sensex closed higher by 35.99 points or 0.17 per cent at 21,373.66.

Larsen and Toubro (L&T) was the most sought after stock after the company reported a 22.44 per cent rise in standalone net profit for the December quarter. The construction and engineering giant was the top Sensex gainer at 2.81 per cent.
Though the Sensex is setting new closing records, the second rank counters underperformed the index, mainly due to profit-booking by wary retail investors at higher levels. The BSE-Midcap and Smallcap indices closed down by 0.48 per cent and 0.12 per cent respectively.

The 50-issue Nifty of NSE settled at 6,345.65, up by 6.70 points or 0.11 per cent. Its record all-time closing high was 6,363.90, registered on December 9, 2013.
Jignesh Chaudhary, Head Of Research, Veracity Broking Services said: "Indian markets continued their rang-bound trading in the absence of fresh triggers. Markets are going to witness another day of subdued trading tomorrow, ahead of RBI's policy decision meeting scheduled on January 28.