Sensex surges by 237.01 points

Mumbai, Apr 17: The Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) sensitive index today surged by 237.01 points to close at 16,481.20 even as Nifty climbed 71.10 points to end at 4,958.40 mark, mirroring strong market sentiments on decline in Inflation.

The benchmark Sensex had earlier climbed to a day's high of 16,570.57, gained over 325 points as investors showed their interest in buying select scrips after the government report of containing inflation, stock brokers said. The marketmen opined that the decline in Inflation numbers boosted the markets sentiment. They said that it was a positive signal to the government measures to control inflation. Positive global cues also fuelled to the sentiments. According to data released by the government today, wholesale price index (WPI)-based Inflation for the week ended April 5 declined to 7.14 per cent as against 7.41 per cent in the earlier week. This was the first weekly decline in Inflation after 8 weeks of rise.

Realty, metal and IT stocks led the positive rally by posting an index gain of 3.5 to 4 per cent followed by banking and telecom stocks, which outperformed the markets.

All BSE sectoral indices, except oil &gas and FMCG index, ended in green. Market breadth remained positive, 2068 shares advanced against 764 shares declined and 243 shares remained unchanged. BSE Midcap and Small cap Indices ended at 6836.39, up 2.05 pc and 8,531.36, up 2.16 pc respectively. Turnover for the day was reported at Rs 64280.63 crore including Rs 15118.92 crore from NSE cash segment, Rs 6700.43 crore from BSE cash segment and the balance Rs 42461.28 crore from NSE F&O segment.

Majority of the index heavyweights, including HDFC Bank, Hindalco, HDFC, DLF and SAIL ended with gains. Realty Index was the top gainer in all indices and ended up by about four per cent at 7,638.73 on good demand in the pivotals.

HDFC Bank, Oriental Bank, Bank of India, Centurion Bank, Allahabad Bank and Axis Bank ended with considerable positive gap. Power stocks also pared the gains today due to buying seen in CESC, Power Grid Corp, Suzlon Energy and Tata Power.

However, FMCG stocks were under selling pressure in late trade and ended with a marginal loss. HUL, Colgate and Britannia were the major losers.

UNI