Sensex, Nifty Surge On Strong Global Cues Led By Reliance, Infosys

The Indian equity benchmarks surged on Monday tacking strong upmove in other Asian markets after as oil prices eased, tempering fears of prolonged inflation and the accompanying aggressive Federal Reserve tightening. The S&P BSE Sensex rose as much as 782 points and Nifty 50 index touched an intraday high of 15,927.

As of 9:25 am, the Sensex was up 625 points at 53,353 and Nifty 50 index advanced 184 points to 15,883.

Stocks gained in Asia amid improved risk sentiment after Wall Street rebounded strongly at the end of last week as oil prices eased, tempering fears of prolonged inflation and the accompanying aggressive Federal Reserve tightening.

Treasury yields remained subdued and the dollar hovered near the lowest in more than a week as investors continued to assess the outlook for U.S. rate hikes, and the potential for a recession.

Japan's Nikkei rose 1.41 per cent, Hong Kong's Hang Seng climbed 2.62 per cent, Taiwan Weighted rose 1.91 per cent and South Korea's KOSPI gained 2.06 per cent.

US stocks racked up more gains on Wall Street Friday, as the S&P 500 had its best day in two years and just its second winning week in the last 12 to provide a bit of relief from the market’s brutal sell-off this year.

The benchmark index rose 3.1 per cent, with technology and banks leading the broad rally. The S&P 500 notched a 6.4 per cent gain for the week, erasing the brutal loss it took a week earlier, though it’s still close to 20 per cent below its record set early this year.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 2.7 per cent and the tech-heavy Nasdaq ended 3.3 per cent higher. Both indexes also posted a weekly gain that more than made up for their losses last week.

Back home, buying was visible across the board as all the 15 sector gauges compiled by the National Stock Exchange were trading higher led by the Nifty IT index's nearly 3 per cent gain. Nifty Bank, Auto, Financial Services, Media, Metal, Pharma, PSU Bank, Private Bank and Realty indices also rose over 1 per cent each.

Infosys was among the top Nifty gainers, the stock rose over 2.5 per cent to Rs 1,480 after its co-founder and chairman Nandan Nilekani said IT services firm Infosys gave capital return of over Rs 24,100 crore (about USD 3.1 billion) in 2021-22 with a total dividend of Rs 31 per share along with share buyback of over Rs 11,000 crore.

While speaking at the 41st Annual General Meeting (AGM) of the company, Nilekani announced that the 2021-22 fiscal has been a year of exceptional growth – 19.7 per cent in constant currency – bringing in USD 16.3 billion, which is the fastest growth that Infosys has recorded in 11 years.

Tech Mahindra, HCL Technologies, Wipro, JSW Steel, Larsen & Toubro, Bajaj Finance, TCS, Tata Motors, IndusInd Bank and Hindalco also rose between1.6-4 per cent.

On the flipside, Apollo Hospitals and Eicher Motors were among the notable losers.