Sensex, Nifty close at record highs amid volatility

Notwithstanding volatility, equity benchmarks closed at record highs on the back of investors’ interest in IT and financial stocks on Thursday. While the BSE Sensex advanced 350.81 points, or 0.47 per cent, to close at 74,227.63, the broader NSE Nifty50 gained 80 points, or 0.36 per cent, to close at 22,514.65.

Expiry of weekly index options, expectation of a status-quo stance on interest rates by the the RBI’s Monetary Policy Committee anchored the market direction. The central bank’s rate setting panel will announce its decision on repo rate on Friday.

Prashanth Tapse, Senior VP (Research), Mehta Equities, said, “Volatility may persist due to renewed uptick in the US bond yields on fading hopes of a rate cut over next few months. This will continue to weigh on Indian markets too, and along with FII selling pressure, local equities may continue to face the heat,” he added.

Gainers, losers

Within the Sensex pack, HDFC Bank (3.06 per cent), Titan (1.89 per cent), Tech Mahindra (1.80 per cent), Asian Paints (1.72 per cent) and TCS (1.41 per cent) were the major gainers. However, SBI (1.52 per cent), Bharti Airtel (1.51 per cent), Power Grid Corporation (0.96 per cent), JSW Steel (0.73 per cent) and ITC (0.60 per cent) were the major laggards.

In broad market, while BSE 500 and BSE SmallCap gained 0.27 per cent and 0.54 per cent, respectively, BSE MidCap fell 0.11 per cent.

Among the sectoral indices, BSE Information Technology (0.93 per cent), BSE Consumer Durables (0.85 per cent) and BSE Utilities (0.78 per cent) were the major gainers. On the other hand, BSE Oil & Gas (1.64 per cent), BSE Energy (1.01 per cent) were the major losers.

Of the 3,947 stocks traded on BSE, 2,382 advanced, 1,465 declined and 100 remained unchanged. While 214 stocks hit a 52-week high, 7 stocks hit a 52-week low.

Foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) remained net sellers on Thursday as well, as they sold equities worth ₹1,136.47 crore, per provisional data on exchanges.