Sensex, Nifty Edge Higher Led By Gains In IT, Metal Shares

The Indian equity benchmarks opened higher on Tuesday led by gains in Infosys, HDFC Bank, Tata Consultancy Services, Tata Steel, Larsen & Toubro and Tech Mahindra. The Sensex rose as much as 261 points to hit an intraday high of 55,816.70 and Nifty 50 index touched an intraday high of 16,585. Meanwhile, Asian stocks rose on Tuesday on an extended bounce on Wall Street as investors drew comfort from full approval granted to the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine and on easing worries of an imminent tapering of stimulus by the Federal Reserve.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan rose 1.2 per cent, with Japan and South Korean indexes jumping more than 1 per cent. Australia shares were up 0.2 per cent and Taiwan stocks rose 0.7 per cent.

Back home, fourteen of 19 sector gauges compiled by the BSE were trading higher led by the S&P BSE Oil & Gas and Metal indexes' over 1.5 per cent gain.

Information technology, Industrials, Utilities, Capital Goods, Power, Realty and Basic Materials indices also rose between 0.5-1.5 per cent.

Mid- and small-cap shares were witnessing buying interest as S&P BSE MidCap index rose 0.9 per cent and S&P BSE SmallCap index advanced 0.69 per cent.

Tata Steel was top Nifty gainer, the stock rose 3 per cent to Rs 1,400. Hindalco, NTPC, Tech Mahindra, ONGC, Indian Oil, JSW Steel, Coal India, Larsen & Toubro, IndusInd Bank and Power Grid also rose between 1-3 per cent.

On the flipside, Asian Paints, Maruti Suzuki, Kotak Mahindra Bank, HDFC, Nestle India, Divi's Labs, Hindustan Unilever, HCL Technologies, Shree Cements, Titan, SBI Life, ICICI Bank and Sun Pharma were among the losers.

The overall market breadth was positive as 1,432 shares were advancing while 1,055 were declining on the BSE.