Dalal Street opened at record highs on Thursday and how! Tracking recovery of stocks and commodities in global markets, the S&P BSE Sensex hit a fresh record high, rising by 212.85 points or 0.59 per cent to trade at 36,478.78 and the Nifty50 index surged 64.15 points or 0.59 per cent to reclaim the 11,000 level as it traded at 11,012.45. Earlier, at 09:12 am, the Nifty futures on SGX indicated a higher opening for the domestic market as they traded 30.50 points or 0.28 per cent higher at 10,978. At 11.59 am on Thursday, the S&P BSE Sensex traded at 36,672.37, with a gain of 406.44 points or 1.12% per cent while the broader Nifty50 was at 11,067.70 level, up 119.40 points or 1.09% per cent.
Twenty six out of 30 BSE Sensex stocks started on a higher note. Major gainers in the 30-share Sensex pack in the early session were Asian Paints (+1.48 per cent), Reliance Industries (+1.27 per cent), Kotak Mahindra Bank (+1.18 per cent), SBI (+1.08 per cent), Coal India (+1.04 per cent) and Induslnd Bank (+1.00 per cent). Top laggards in the Sensex pack at the same time were TCS (-0.29 per cent), ITC (0.16 per cent), Mahindra & Mahindra (0.39 per cent) and ONGC (-1.36 per cent).
(IOC, Hindustan Petroleum, BPCL, Dr Reddy, HCL Tech were leading the pack of Nifty gainers in early trade.)
Hindustan Petroleum (+4.19 per cent), IOC (+4.01 per cent), BPCL (+3.87 per cent), Dr Reddy’s (+2.85 per cent) and HCL Tech (+2.13 per cent) led the pack of Nifty gainers while the main losers on the index in the morning session were Bharti Infratel (-2.73 per cent), TCS (-0.63 per cent), GAIL (0.34 per cent), Infosys (-0.29 per cent) and Wipro (-0.26 per cent).
Meanwhile, global markets consolidated from previous sessions’ sheer losses. Fears of an escalation in the US-China trade war nudged investor’s sentiments on Wednesday. China’s Shanghai Composite Exchange traded at 2,830.44, up 52.67 points or 1.90 per cent while Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index was up at 28,512.87 level, with a gain of 201.18 points or 0.71 per cent.
In commodities markets, Brent crude futures rose 1.35 per cent to $74.38 a barrel after tanking 6.9 per cent overnight, the biggest one-day percentage drop since February 2016.
On Wednesday, domestic stock markets swung between gains and losses all through the trading session and ended marginally higher. The S&P BSE Sensex settled at 36,265.93, while the broader Nifty50 closed at 10,948.30.
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