Sensex, Nifty resume upward march; heavyweight stocks save the day

Thanks to gains in shares of select banking and IT heavyweights, the Indian stock market benchmarks, the Sensex and the Nifty 50, resumed their upward march on Monday.

As many as 249 stocks, including HCL Tech, Tech Mahindra, Persistent Systems, Trent, and Divi's Labs, hit their fresh one-year highs in intraday trade on BSE on Monday.

Coforge, Dixon Technologies, Gujarat Fluorochemicals, Ipca Laboratories, Mankind Pharma, Oberoi Realty, Page Industries, National Aluminium Company, and Glenmark Pharmaceuticals were also among the stocks that hit their 52-week highs in intraday trade.

The Sensex closed 592 points, or 0.73 percent, higher at 81,973.05, while the Nifty 50 settled at 25,127.95, up 164 points, or 0.66 percent.

The midcap and smallcap segments also ended with gains but underperformed the benchmarks. The BSE Midcap index rose 0.28 percent, while the Smallcap index inched up by 0.06 percent.

The overall market capitalisation of the BSE-listed stocks rose to nearly ₹463.6 lakh crore from ₹462.3 lakh crore in the previous session, making investors' wealth rise by about ₹1.3 lakh crore in a single session.

Top gainers

Shares of Tech Mahindra, HDFC Bank, Larsen and Toubro, ITC, and IndusInd Bank ended as the top gainers in the Sensex index. On the flip side, shares of Maruti Suzuki, Tata Steel, Bajaj Finance, Axis Bank, and UltraTech Cement ended as the top losers in the index.

Banking, financial, and IT stocks led the gains. The Nifty Bank index rose 1.26 percent, while the Private Bank index and Financial Services indices climbed 1.07 percent and 1.04 percent, respectively. The Nifty IT index rose 1.27 percent, the Nifty Realty index jumped 1.61 percent.

"A sharp fall in crude oil prices provided a major impetus to the markets, as markets ended in positive territory led by gains in banking, IT and realty stocks. The recovery may not fuel strong bullish sentiment, as FIIs' deserting Indian markets this month coupled with lingering West Asia conflict has created a lot of uncertainty among the investors," said Prashanth Tapse of Mehta Equities.

Shrikant Chouhan of Kotak Securities underscored that the Nifty 50 is trading near its 50-day SMA (simple moving average) and on intraday charts. It is holding a higher bottom formation, which is largely positive.

"As long as the index is trading above 25,000/81,500, the pullback formation is likely to continue. On the higher side, the market could move up to 25,200-25,260/82,300-82,500. On the flip side, below 25,000/81,500, the sentiment could change. Below the same, the market could retest the level of 24,900-24,840/81,200-81,000," said Mr Chouhan.

(By arrangement with livemint.com)