Business & Finance

Sensex soars 336 pts, reclaims 39,000-mark; Tata Steel rallies 7 pc

Mumbai: The BSE Sensex rallied 336 points to reclaim the 39,000-level Friday, capping off a volatile week where investors grappled with flaring oil prices and sudden sell-offs at higher levels.

Trading received a boost Friday after global oil prices slipped below the USD 75 per barrel mark and blue-chips posted encouraging results.

A strengthening rupee and unabated foreign fund inflows also bolstered sentiment, traders said.

The 30-share BSE Sensex, which opened on a firm footing, was propelled by a burst of buying in late-afternoon trade. It finally closed at 39,067.33, up 336.47 points, or 0.87 per cent.

On similar lines, the NSE Nifty climbed 112.85 points, or 0.97 per cent, to 11,754.65.

It was a highly volatile week for the benchmarks, with the Sensex logging a gain/loss of more than 300 points for four out of five sessions.

During the week, Sensex dropped 72 points, or 0.18 per cent; while the Nifty gained just 1.85 points, or 0.01 per cent.

Tata Steel was the biggest gainer in the Sensex pack Friday, spurting 6.67 per cent after the company posted a rise in consolidated income for the March quarter.

Axis Bank gained 2.61 per cent it reported a net profit of Rs 1,505 crore for the March quarter, driven by a significant decline in provisioning and higher interest income.

ICICI Bank, TCS, SBI, RIL, Infosys, HDFC twins, Kotak Bank, HUL, NTPC, IndusInd Bank, Sun Pharma, HCL Tech, Bajaj Finance L&T and ITC were the other gainers, rising up to 3.05 per cent.

On the other hand, Tata Motors, Bajaj Auto, Maruti, Bharti Airtel, Coal India, M&M and Vedanta fell up to 2.84 per cent.

Hero MotoCorp and Yes Bank ended up to 0.51 per cent lower ahead of their quarterly earnings.

“Falling crude prices and rising rupee helped sentiments on the street. Chinese stocks fell on Friday, posting their sharpest weekly fall since October 2018, as investors feared that China may not continue its stimulus measures amid signs of economic stabilisation.

“The US-China trade issues that are taking longer than expected to be resolved also weighed on sentiments,” said Deepak Jasani, Head- Retail Research, HDFC Securities.

Sectorally, BSE metal, bankex, oil and gas, IT, energy and teck indices ended in the green, rising up to 1.92 per cent.

BSE auto, consumer durables and telecom finished with losses of up to 1.06 per cent.

Meanwhile, broader indices underperformed the benchmarks, with the BSE Midcap and Smallcap shedding up to 0.44 per cent.

Brent crude futures, the global oil benchmark, slipped 1.28 per cent to USD 73.41 per barrel.

The rupee rebounded 25 paise to 70 against the US dollar intra-day.

Meanwhile, foreign institutional investors (FIIs) purchased equity worth Rs 3,785.73 crore on Thursday, while domestic institutional investors (DIIs) sold shares to the tune of Rs 4,069.98 crore, provisional data available with stock exchanges showed.

Elsewhere in Asia, benchmark equity indices in Shanghai, Tokyo and Seoul ended on a negative note. European equities were also weak in early trade.

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