Sensex, Nifty rally nearly 1 pc; key indices rise for fourth straight session

Sensex and Nifty rallied nearly 1 per cent on Wednesday as the benchmark indices closed in positive territory for the fourth straight trading session on the back of gains in IT and financial shares.

A day ahead of the Reserve Bank of India's monetary policy review, the 30-share BSE Sensex surged 582.87 points or 0.99 per cent to settle at the nearly four-week high of 59,689.31. As many as 21 stocks in the index ended in the green and nine in the red.

After a gap-up opening, the index touched a high of 59,747.12 points during the session.

The broader NSE Nifty jumped 159 points or 0.91 per cent to close above the 17,550 level at 17,557.05. A total of 37 Nifty shares gained while 13 declined.

In the four-session gaining streak, Sensex spurted by 2,075 points or 3.5 per cent while Nifty rose by nearly 4 per cent or 605 points.

Among the Sensex stocks, Larsen & Toubro rose the most by 3.96 per cent after the company announced a major project win in the Middle East.

HDFC, HDFC Bank, Sun Pharma, ITC, HUL, Titan, TCS, HCL Tech, Asian Paints, Bajaj Finance, Infosys and Tata Steel were among the major gainers.

On the other hand, IndusInd Bank fell the most by 1.26 per cent, followed by Mahindra & Mahindra, NTPC, SBI and Maruti.

Vinod Nair, Head of Research at Geojit Financial Services, said the domestic market is displaying resilience, unaffected by the weaker global peers, thanks to strong banks and NBFCs' quarterly numbers, and the windfall tax cut.

The RBI is expected to announce a 25 basis points rate hike in its policy announcement on Thursday before taking a pause, which will be a positive for the market, he added.

In the broader market, the BSE Midcap gained 0.11 per cent while BSE Smallcap rose by 0.95 per cent.

Among sectoral indices, BSE Capital Goods jumped over 2 per cent. BSE IT, Industrials and FMCG also gained over 1 per cent. Auto, power and PSU bank indices dropped due to profit booking.

Investors are waiting for the Reserve Bank of India's monetary policy decision on Thursday amid inflation remaining relatively high.

Also, India's services sector remained in the expansion zone even as growth moderated in March after hitting a 12-year high in February.

The seasonally adjusted S&P Global India Services PMI Business Activity Index eased from 59.4 in February to 57.8 in March, indicating a slower rate of expansion.

Global markets were mixed as Japan's benchmark Nikkei 225 lost 1.7 per cent, while South Korea's Kospi rose 0.6 per cent. Markets in Hong Kong and Shanghai were closed for a holiday.

In Europe, Germany's DAX dipped 0.3 per cent, France's CAC 40 shed 0.2 per cent while the UK's FTSE 100 marginally rose 0.3 per cent in the afternoon trade.

In the domestic market, Foreign Institutional Investors (FIIs) were net buyers on Monday as they purchased shares worth Rs 321.93 crore.

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