Sensex ends 491 pts higher, Nifty reclaims 17,300; bank stocks rally

The 30-share Sensex ended 491 points higher at 58,411. Its broader peer, Nifty50, ended at 17,311, up 126 points.

Among Sensex stocks,

, , , , and were the top gainers in today’s trading session, rising around 1.5-3 per cent. Reliance, , and also settled higher. However, L&T, , and ended the session with cuts.

Sectorally, the PSU Bank rose 3.47 per cent, and Nifty Pvt Bank surged 1.42 per cent. Nifty Financial Services and Nifty Auto also closed higher. Nifty Midcap50 surged 0.70 per cent, while Smallcap50 declined 0.15 per cent.

Earlier in Asian markets, China’s Shanghai Composite and South Korea’s Kospi surged 0.42 per cent and 0.32 per cent, while Japan’s Nikkei declined 1.16 per cent. The rupee ended at 82.35 per U.S. dollar on Monday, almost unchanged from the previous session. However, brent crude December futures increased 0.40 per cent to $92/barrel.

The market capitalisation of all listed companies on BSE increased by Rs 1.53 lakh crore to Rs 271.81 lakh crore. The market breadth was skewed in favour of bears. About 1,922 stocks declined, 1,612 gained, and 167 remained unchanged.

“Domestic market started weak in line with a volatile global market. However, due to buying on dips strategy, the domestic market is recovering well supported by a good start to Q2 earnings season by IT & Banks,” Vinod Nair, Head of Research at Geojit Financial Services, said.
“Broadly, even though the Q2 preview analysis forecast gave a muted outlook, it is fairly factored in considering the consolidation of the last month. While the outlook for Q3 results has been enhanced due to moderation in operation cost, forecasting a QoQ improvement in profitability and reducing the risk of earnings downgrade,” Nair added.