Sensex, Nifty Off Record Highs; Banking Shares Outperform, Metals Fall

The S&P BSE Sensex and NSE Nifty 50 indexes came off record highs but continue to trade higher led by gains in banking and financial services shares. The benchmarks staged a gap up opening wherein the Sensex rose as much as 360 points to hit record high of 47,714.55 and Nifty 50 index advanced 95 points to hit an all-time high of 13,967.60. However, owing to selling pressure in metal, media and FMCG shares the benchmarks came off record highs.

As of 12:32 pm, the Sensex was up 143 points at 47,496 and Nifty rose 30 points to 13,902.

Gush of liquidity by foreign investors is lifting the benchmarks to new highs on a daily basis, analysts said. In Monday's trading session, foreign institutional investors (FIIs) bought shares worth Rs 1,589 crore. So far this calendar year, FIIs have purchased Indian equities worth $22.21 billion while they have been net sellers in debt markets to the tune of $14 billion, data from NSDL showed.

Six of 11 sector gauges compiled by the National Stock Exchange were trading lower led by the Nifty Metal index's 1.4 per cent fall. FMCG, Pharma, Media and Realty indexes were also trading lower.

On the other hand, Nifty Bank, Private Bank, Financial Services and PSU Bank indexes were trading on a strong note.

Mid- and small-cap shares were trading on a muted note as Nifty Midcap 100 index rose 0.2 per cent and Nifty Smallcap 100 index rose 0.1 per cent.

IndusInd Bank was top Nifty gainer, the stock rose 3.21 per cent to Rs 894. HDFC, Tech Mahindra, HCL Technologies, Axis Bank, Kota Mahindra Bank, Wipro, ITC, Sun Pharma and HDFC Bank were also among the gainers.

On the flipside, Hindalco, NTPC, JSW Steel, Coal India, Nestle India, Tata Motors, ONGC, Tata Steel, HDFC Life and Power Grid were among the losers.

The overall market breadth was neutral as 1,488 shares were declining while 1,313 were advancing on the BSE.