Banks take Sensex, Nifty to new closing high; midcap falls

03:30pm Market Closing Equity benchmarks saw fresh record closing high on Friday aided by banking and financials stocks. The 30-share BSE Sensex rose 267.07 points or 0.95 percent to close at 28334.63 and the 50-share NSE Nifty climbed 75.45 points or 0.90 percent to 8477.35. However, the broader markets underperformed benchmarks with the BSE Midcap and Smallcap indices falling 0.1 percent each. About 1371 shares advanced while 1644 shares declined on the Bombay Stock Exchange. ICICI Bank, BHEL, SBI, Hindalco Industries, Axis Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank and Punjab National Bank rallied 2-4 percent whereas Infosys, Tata Power, Sun Pharma, HUL, Tata Steel, Jindal Steel and Tech Mahindra fell 1-2 percent. 3:00 pm: Market Check It’s been a breathless rally for the Indian stock market today, with both the Sensex and the Nifty venturing into uncharted terrain and scaling fresh all-time highs, not for the first time through this year’s rally. At the time of this writing, the Nifty has surged 1.02 percent, or 85 points, to 8,487 and is within sniffing distance of 8,500. The Sensex is also up 1.02 percent, or 287 points, to 28,355. Banks have led the charge all day with Kotak Mahindra Bank rising 4 percent a day to hit a record high after it announced a USD 2.5 billion worth all-share merger deal that would make it India’s fourth largest private bank behind ICICI, HDFC and Axis. ICICI (up 2.5 percent) too is trading at fresh lifetime highs, How ferocious is the bank rally today can be judged by the fact that the top five gainers in the Nifty and the top eight gainers in the futures space are all banks. The much-watched Bank Nifty sector index has jumped 2.5 percent. Among other sector gainers are autos, capital goods and banks, rising between 0.3 percent and 0.8 percent while pharma is having a dull day despite Cipla rising 1.9 percent on a positive brokerage call. In news-driven stocks, Yes Bank is up 4 percent after the central bank allowed fresh FII buying in the counter, JM Financial is up 1.8 percent after announcing an infusion in its realty subsidiary and appointing former Citi chief Vikram Pandit to its board and Financial Technologies, which gained 3.2 percent after Jignesh Shah, accused of being involved in the NSEL scam, stepped down from its board. More information please visit this site www.bigprofitbuzz.com