Nifty closes above 5300...Sensex tops 17,600

The Indian stock market ended in the positive terrain for a fourth straight session, with the benchmarks closing near day’s high. Once again, it was a splendid week for the Indian market, with the NSE Nifty and the BSE Sensex closing above 5300 and 17,600, respectively. With this, they have now gained for five successive weeks. Both the indices are up 11-12% each year-to-date. The rupee too has rallied in lock step with the local equities and a worldwide 'risk on' rally.

As far as Friday is concerned, after trading in a narrow range for most part of the day, the benchmarks suddenly leapt back to life in late afternoon. Sustained buying was seen in index heavyweights like HUL, NTPC, Sun Pharma, DLF, BHEL and TCS.



The BSE Sensex ended at 17,605, up 173 points from the last close. It earlier touched a day's high of 17,630 and hit day's low of 17,382.

The Nifty settled at 5,326, up 56 points. It hit a day’s high of 5,335 and day’s low of 5,255.

The market breadth was in favor of the bulls. On the BSE, 1717 stocks advanced as against only 1166 declining stocks and 112 stocks remained unchanged.

The INDIA VIX on the NSE was up ~1.7% to close at 24.09. The index hit day's high of 24.49 and hit day’s low of 23.39.

The BSE Realty index was up more than 2%, while Pharma, Power, FMCG, Banking, Oil & Gas and PSU indices gained 1% to 1.7%. Only the BSE Metals index was in the red, down ~1%. Other sectoral indices were marginally higher.

The main Indian equity benchmarks opened nearly unchanged and remained largely listless before the the afternoon spurt breathed some life into them, as investors took a pause after three successive days of gains. Sentiment was also edgy ahead of tomorrow's lower court ruling on P. Chidambaram's alleged role in the 2G scam.

On the global front, Asian markets were cautious today as investors awaited the release of monthly US jobs data on Friday and talks on the proposed debt swap in Greece remained inconclusive. Markets in China and Hong Kong recovered from their session lows.

European stock indices opened mostly lower today, with banks and miners pacing the decline, but soon recovered to be marginally higher. The US markets finished mostly flat on Thursday.

Meanwhile, the Rupee was headed for a fifth weekly gain, the longest winning streak since Oct. 2010 on the back of strong FII inflows and better-than-expected manufacturing PMI data.

The rupee advanced past 49 per dollar yesterday for the first time since November, as exchange data showed that FIIs poured in US$536mn into Indian shares in the first three days of this week.

On Feb. 1, HSBC Holdings Plc and Markit Economics reported that India’s Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) rose to 57.5 in January from 54.2 in December.
Separately, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) Deputy Governor Subir Gokarn said that the central bank will cut borrowing costs once it is confident that inflation will keep slowing.

The euro headed for a weekly decline as Greece and its creditors struggle to reach an agreement on a debt swap.

The yen traded near a postwar high versus the dollar, raising speculation that the country will intervene to weaken the Japanese currency. The euro slid against the yen.

Asian currencies were headed for a fifth weekly advance, led by Taiwan’s dollar, as foreign investors pumped fresh money into the region amid optimism that the global economy is holding up well in the face of near recession in Europe.