Sensex Rises 222 Points, Nifty settles Above 15,150 Led By Reliance Industries

The Indian equity benchmarks ended Thursday's choppy session on a positive note led by gains in Reliance Industries, Hindustan Unilever, Bajaj Finance, Sun Pharma and Axis Bank. For most part of the day, benchmarks traded in a narrow range on the back of heightened volatility owing to weekly expiry of index derivative contracts. The Sensex traded in a range of 435 points and Nifty 50 index touched an intraday high of 15,188.50 and low of 15,065.40.

The Sensex ended 222 points higher at 51,531.52 and Nifty 50 index advanced 67 points to close at 15,173.30.

Reliance Industries was top Nifty gainer, the stock rose over 4 per cent to close at Rs 2,061.80. Reliance Industries alone added more than 250 points towards gain in the Sensex.

Hindalco advanced over 5 per cent to close at Rs 294 after its net profit in December quarter rose 90 per cent to Rs 2,021 crore.

Sun Pharma, Adani Ports, GAIL India, Power Grid, Bajaj Finance, UPL, Bharat Petroleum, Power Grid, Bajaj Finance, Britannia Industries and HCL Technologies rose between 1.3-2.6 per cent.

On the flipside, Eicher Motors fell 2.5 per cent to Rs 2,827 after December quarter earnings and Titan dropped 2.45 per cent to Rs 1,524 after its profit declined 11 per cent in third quarter of current financial year.

Larsen & Toubro, Tata Motors, Coal India, HDFC Life, JSW Steel, Cipla and ONGC were also among the losers.

"The momentum observed in the indicators like RSI, MACD to continue to show divergence, supporting the view that the market is likely to take a pause around theses levels and stay in a range," said Ashis Biswas, head of technical research at CapitalVia Global Research.

Six of 11 sector gauges compiled by the National Stock Exchange ended lower led by the Nifty PSU Bank index's over 1 per cent fall. Nifty Auto, media, bank, financial services and realty indexes also ended lower.

On the other hand, metal, IT and FMCG indexes rose between 0.6-1 per cent.

Mid- and small-cap shares ended on a mixed note as Nifty Midcap 100 index rose 0.2 per cent while Nifty Smallcap 100 index jumped nearly 2 per cent.

The overall market breadth was positive as 1,726 shares ended higher while 1,260 ended lower on the BSE.