Sensex shoots up 481 points; Nifty reclaims 11,300-level

The BSE benchmark Sensex Tuesday soared over 481 points on intense buying mainly in financial, energy and telecom stocks amid strong foreign fund inflows and positive global cues.

The 30-share BSE gauge settled 481.56 points, or 1.30 per cent, higher at 37,535.66. The broader NSE Nifty reclaimed the psychological 11,300-level and closed with gains of 133.15 points, or 1.19 per cent, at 11,301.20.

In the Sensex pack, Bharti Airtel was the top performer, surging 4.61 per cent.

Other gainers included ICICI Bank, IndusInd Bank, L&T, Sun Pharma, RIL, HDFC duo, Tata Motors and M&M -- climbing up to 3.69 per cent.

Bucking the overall trend, Bajaj Finance, Infosys, ONGC, NTPC, Coal India, Yes Bank, Bajaj Auto, SBI, Hero MotoCorp and TCS fell as much as 1.13 per cent.

Sectorally, the BSE realty index topped the chart, surging 2.60 per cent, followed by telecom, bankex, healthcare and finance indices.

"The market has been moving from strength to strength in the last couple of weeks with impressive performances across market breadth on the back of reduced political uncertainty," Devang Mehta, Head-Equity Advisory, Centrum Wealth Management, said.

The much awaited flows of money from the foreign institutional investors seem to have started at least for the time being, which is a prominent factor leading to this pre-election rally, he added.

On a net basis, foreign institutional investors (FIIs) bought shares worth a net of Rs 3,810.60 crore on Monday, provisional data available with BSE showed.

On the global front, most central banks have been adopting a softer stance and with low inflation and declining interest rate scenario in India and an expected earnings recovery on the cards, there is an expectation that Indian equities receive reasonable foreign money allocations, Mehta added.

In Asia, Hong Kong's Hang Seng jumped 1.46 per cent, Shanghai Composite Index 1.10 per cent and Korea's Kospi gained 0.89 per cent. Japan's Nikkei ended 1.79 per cent higher.

In the Eurozone, Frankfurt's DAX was up 0.28 per cent and Paris CAC 40 rose 0.28 per cent. London's FTSE fell 0.32 per cent in early deals.

Global crude benchmark Brent crude futures rose 0.98 per cent to USD 67.23 per barrel.

Meanwhile, the rupee appreciated 35 paise to 69.54 against the US dollar intra-day.