Sensex rallies 515 pts to reclaim 59,000-mark; IT, finance stocks sparkle

PTI

Mumbai, August 11

Sensex rallied 515 points on Thursday to reclaim the 59,000-mark after a gap of four months, propelled by heavy buying in IT, banking and financial stocks amid sustained foreign fund inflows and positive Asian equities.

The Sensex ended 515.31 points higher at 59,332.60 — its highest closing since April 8, 2022. Similarly, the Nifty gained 124.25 points to close at 17,659.

Axis Bank top gainer

• Axis Bank was the top gainer in the Sensex pack, climbing 2.75%, followed by Bajaj Finance, HDFC, Tech Mahindra, TCS, SBI and Wipro
• On the other hand, ITC, NTPC, HUL, Bharti Airtel, Maruti and Nestle India were among the major laggards, sliding as much as 1.56%

Market breadth was in favour of the bulls, with 19 of the 30 Sensex counters logging gains.

“Investors cheered the US inflation data for July, which raised hopes that the Federal Reserve may not be that aggressive in hiking interest rates in its next meeting. Hence, the optimism spread across Asian markets, including India where investors lapped up banking, IT and realty stocks. “Traders have also been drawing comfort from the falling crude oil prices and FII inflows into the local shares in the past few sessions,” said Shrikant Chouhan, Head of Equity Research (Retail), Kotak Securities Ltd.