Sensex rallied nearly 300 points and the broader Nifty reclaimed its crucial psychological level of 9,200 led by gains in banking, infrastructure and real estate shares amid strong global cues as investors breathed a sigh of relief after the market's favoured candidate, Emmanuel Macron, won the first round of the French presidential election. The outcome led to a mass unwinding of safe-haven trades in favour of riskier assets.
In the intraday deals, the Sensex opened on a flat note with a positive bias and as the day progressed the benchmark indices gained momentum with gains in heavyweights such as HDFC Bank, HDFC, Larsen & Toubro and Reliance Industries. In the intraday deals, the Sensex rallied as much as 316 points and the Nifty touched intraday high of 9,225.
From the Nifty basket of shares, 39 ended higher while 12 ended on a negative note.
ACC was the top Nifty gainer, the stock surged 8 per cent to hit fresh 52-week high of Rs 1,615.60 after the cement maker post market hours on Friday reported better than expected earnings for the quarter ended March 2017. ACC which follows January to December financial year reported standalone net profit of Rs. 211.50 crore on sales of Rs. 3,556.70 crore in Q1. Analysts polled by NDTV Profit expected the cement maker to report net profit of Rs. 143 crore on sales of Rs. 3,152 crore.
Grasim Industries, GAIL India, Ambuja Cements, Larsen & Toubro, Axis Bank, HDFC Bank, Maruti Suzuki, Tata Power, Bank of Baroda, Kotak Mahindra Bank, HDFC and Adani Ports were also among the gainers.
On the other hand, Lupin, Cipla, Aurobindo Pharma, Indian Oil, NTPC, and Hindustan Unilever were among the laggards.
Reliance Industries, which will report its fourth quarter earnings later in the day, ended over 1 per cent higher. According to analysts polled by NDTV Profit, Reliance Industries is likely to report a consolidated net profit of Rs 8,046 crore for the March quarter.
The Sensex ended 290 points higher at 29,656 and Nifty advanced 99 points to settle at 9,218.
The broader markets were in-line with the benchmark indices, up nearly 1 per cent each.
(With Reuters inputs)
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