Mumbai, Aug. 27 (IANS): It was a complete bull-run in progress throughout the trading session in the Indian equity market on Monday, with both the key indices surging over one per cent and scaling new highs.
In a first, the S&P BSE Sensex crossed the 38,700-points mark and touched an all-time high of 38,736.88 points, tracking broadly positive global cues. Similarly, the NSE Nifty50 touched a fresh record high of 11,700.95 points.
Both the indices also settled at their respective record closing levels.
A surge in banking stocks among others supported the indices. The S&P BSE banking index rose by around 530 points during the day.
Index-wise, the wider Nifty50 on the National Stock Exchange closed at 11,691.95 points, higher by 134.85 points or 1.17 per cent from its previous close of 11,557.10 points.
The benchmark BSE Sensex, which had opened at 38,472.03 points, closed at 38,694.11 points, higher by 442.31 points or 1.16 per cent from its previous close of 38,251.80 points.
It touched an intra-day low of 38,416.73 points.
Along with positive global developments, strong buying by foreign institutional investors (FII) gave further fillip to domestic investor sentiment, said Abhijeet Dey, Senior Fund Manager Equities, BNP Paribas Mutual Fund.
"Global sentiment got a boost after US Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said that gradual rate hikes are now expected and China's central bank decided to lift its official yuan midpoint by more than what the street expected," he added.
Major Asian markets closed on a sharply positive note and European indices like DAX and CAC 40 traded in the green, said Deepak Jasani, Head of Retail Research at HDFC Securities.
On the currency front, the Indian rupee settled at 70.16 per dollar, 25 paise weaker than its previous close of 69.91 per dollar.
Investment-wise, provisional data with exchanges showed that foreign institutional investors bought scrips worth Rs 252.52 crore whereas domestic institutional investors purchased stocks worth Rs 1,117.24 crore.
Sector-wise, the S&P BSE banking index surged the most, by 530.08 points, followed by the IT index, which was up 231.56 points and the consumer durables index which ended 224.37 points higher than its previous close.
In contrast, the S&P BSE realty index was the only losing sector and it ended marginally lower by 3.44 points from its previous close.
The top gainers on the Sensex were Bharti Airtel, up 3.93 per cent at Rs 383; Power Grid, up 3.64 per cent at Rs 197.80; ICICI Bank, up 2.97 at Rs 339.90; State Bank of India, up 2.65 per cent at Rs 308.25; and Infosys, up 2.53 per cent at Rs 1,414.90 per share.
The only loser on the Sensex was Sun Pharma, which ended 1.25 per cent lower at Rs 621.80 per share.
