Mumbai: In a volatile trade, the stock market benchmark Sensex on Friday soared higher by 183 points, led by gains in IT stocks as Infosys beat market expectations with a robust set of quarterly results.
After opening on a strong note, the 30-scrip BSE index touched a high of 27,507.67 points in early trade amid firm global trends, but the markets saw heavy profit booking in late afternoon session in realty, infrastructure, power, banking capital goods and metal stocks.
This pulled down the index to the day's low of 27,119.63 points. The BSE barometer finally closed with a rise of 183.67 points, or 0.67 per cent to 27,458.38.
The gauge had gained 365.89 points yesterday on the back of encouraging US data and recovery in crude oil price.
The broad-based Nifty of the National Stock Exchange also regained the psychological 8,300-mark in early trade, but succumbed to profit-booking later and dipped to a low of 8,190.80, before finally ending the day 49.90 points, or 0.61 per cent higher at 8,284.50.
Strengthening rupee, which appreciated further to over four-week high of 62.35 levels intra-day against the US dollar today, also buoyed trading sentiments, brokers said.
Shares of Infosys, India's second-largest IT firm, jumped 5.02 per cent to Rs 2,073.60 after the software major reported a 13 per cent growth in consolidated net to Rs 3,250 crore for the quarter ended December 31, 2014.
The blue-chip stock emerged as the second top performer among the front-line scrips on both the Sensex and Nifty during the session. Meanwhile, buying was also seen in other IT stocks with TCS rising 2.80 per cent, to Rs 2,512.20 and Wipro gaining 1.54 per cent, to close at Rs 553.45.
Led by gains in these stocks, the BSE IT index rose the most among sectoral indices by surging 3.51 per cent, followed by Teck index by 2.44 per cent. Healthcare index (1.78 pc), Oil & Gas index (1.59 pc), Consumer Durables index (0.83 pc) and FMCCG index (0.29 pc) were among other gainers.
Major gainers that supported the Sensex were Hindustan Unilever, Dr Reddys, ONGC, RIL, Tata Motors, Cipla, Hindalco, Sun Pharma, GAIL, Tata Steel, HDFC Bank, Hero MotoCorp and M&M. Losers among 30-Sensex constituents included NTPC, Bajaj Auto, ITC, ICICI Bank, Sesa Sterlite, Axis Bank, Bharti Airtel, BHEL, HDFC, Coal India, L&T, SBI and Maruti Suzuki.
Meanwhile, Foreign Portfolio Investors sold shares worth a net Rs 466.78 crore on Thursday.
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