Sensex ends 75 points up, health care and auto stocks rise

A benchmark index of Indian equities markets closed 75 points higher Wednesday on buying in health care, automobile, metals and banks stocks.

Trade was initially hit in the wake of the Reserve Bank of India's decision Tuesday not to change policy rates in its second quarter review of the monetary policy.
However, the markets rebounded with value buying in health care, automobile, metals and banks stocks.

The 30-scrip sensitive index (Sensex) of the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), which opened at 18,436.79 points, closed at 18,505.38 points, 74.53 points or 0.40 percent up from its previous day's close at 18,430.85 points.

The Sensex touched a high of 18,521.62  points and a low of 18,398.48 in intra-day trade. The BSE midcap index was up by 57.35 points, while the smallcap index closed 34.35 points higher.

On the sectoral front, the BSE auto index was up 157.36 points, followed by health care index, up 129.07 points, metals index, up 120.13 points and bank index, up 76.68 points.

However, the capital goods index was down by 40.50 points. And so was oil and gas index, down 25.06 points.

The major Sensex gainers were Hindalco Inds, up 5.00 percent at Rs.116.45; Maruti Suzuki, up 2.99 percent at Rs.1,436.25; Tata Motors, up 2.81 percent at Rs.254.65; Cipla, up 2.52 percent at Rs.363.50; and Jindal Steel, up 2.12 percent at Rs.387.40.

The main losers included ONGC, down by 1.72 percent at Rs.268.30; Gail India, down by 1.70 percent at Rs.348.80; BHEL, down by 1.32 percent at Rs.225.10; Larsen and Toubro (L&T), down by 0.80 percent at Rs.1,624.75; and Hindustan Uniliver, down by 0.55 percent at Rs.547.45.

The wider 50-scrip S&P CNX Nifty of the National Stock Exchange (NSE) was lower by 21.08 points or 0.39 percent up at 5,619.70 points.

Other Asian markets too closed higher. Japan's Nikkei was up by 0.98 percent, while Hong Kong's Hang Seng closed 1.00 percent higher. Shanghai's Composite Index ended up gaining 0.32 percent.

At closing bell here, trading was mixed in European markets. London's FTSE 100 was trading 0.18 percent down, while the German DAX and France's CAC were 0.60 and 0.31 percent up, respectively.