Mumbai: Market benchmark Sensex hit a nearly17-month high today after surging 446 points to 28,978.02 and the Nifty zoomed 133.35 points led by heavy buying in auto and banking stocks on bullish overseas cues amid dimming hopes of an interest-rate hike by the US Fed this month.
Domestic markets, which opened today for the first time since Friday, reacted to a weak US jobs data released last week, diminishing hopes for a near-term US interest rate hike. Moreover, rupee climbing to four-month highs against the dollar to trade at Rs 66.51 (intra-day), as Urjit Patel begun his innings as RBI Governor, too had a positive impact.
The 30-share BSE Sensex resumed higher and continued its upward journey to cross the 29,000-mark for the first time since April 15, 2015, and touched a high of 29,013.40 before concluding at 28,978.02, a significant gain of 445.91 or 1.56 per cent. This was the biggest single-day gain since July 11, when it had gained 499.79 points. The NSE Nifty again went past the 8,900-mark to touch a high of 8,950.85 and finally settled 133.35 points or 1.51 per cent higher at 8,943.00.
The bourses had remained closed yesterday on account of 'Ganesh Chaturthi'. The second-line stocks also witnessed heavy buying, lifting the mid-cap index by 1.84 per cent and small-cap by 0.95 per cent. Sentiment also boosted after services sector growth touched the highest level in over three-and-a-half years of 54.7 in August from 51.9 in July.
Among sectoral indices, bankex topped by climbing 2.96 per cent followed by consumer durables 2.94 per cent, auto 2.83 per cent, power 1.39 per cent, realty 1.23 per cent, metal 1.21 per cent, oil and gas 1.04 per cent and FMCG 0.97 per cent. Out of the 30-share Sensex pack, 25 scrips ended with gains, while 4 registered loss. Sun Pharma ended steady.
Elsewhere, Asian stocks ended higher with Japan's Nikkei rising 0.26 per cent, Hong Kong's Hang Seng was up 0.58 per cent while Shanghai Composite Index rose 0.61 per cent. European markets also opened on a positive note. London's FTSE, Paris CAC 40 and Frankfurt's DAX 30, gained up to 0.3 per cent in their early deals.
