Sensex ends Samvat 2075 on a muted note, inches up 38 pts

Mumbai: Benchmark equity index Sensex staged smart a rebound on Friday and managed to close in the green on Friday, helped by gains in banking shares. Nifty, on the other hand, closed unchanged.

For Samvat 2075, Sensex advanced nearly 11 per cent, mainly on the strength of brisk buying in select index heavyweights.

On Friday, ICICI Bank (89.93 points) contributed the most to the Sensex’s gains, with a 3.18 per cent rise. The country’s largest lender State Bank of India (68.73 points), followed next as it rallied 7.19 per cent on a superb show in September quarter earnings. SBI posted 218 per cent jump in profit for the September quarter at Rs 3,011.73 crore.


Market at a glance
BSE Sensex closed 0.10 per cent or 37.67 points higher at 39,058.06, while NSE Nifty edged up 0.01 per cent or 1.30 points to close at 11,583.90.

As many as 13 out of 30 Sensex stocks closed higher. Bears were in charge with losers beating gainers in the ratio of 1.3:1 on the BSE.

BSE Bankex and BSE IT index led the gains with 1 per cent rise each. Among the losers, BSE Consumer Durables and BSE Telecom shed the most. They fell 1.78 per cent and 1 .67 per cent, respectively.

Shares of jewellery companies fell as gold demand remained muted during Dhanteras, the first day that marks the festival of Diwali.

PC Jeweller was down 4.07 per cent, Tribhovandas Bhimji Zaveri was down 6.6.5 per cent, while Titan dropped 2.94 per cent.

Analyst views
“We feel banking stocks, especially private banking majors have the potential to push the benchmark higher from hereon as other sectoral heavyweights have played their part or reeling under pressure. In absence of any major event, earnings and global cues would continue to dictate the market trend. We suggest limiting leveraged positions and focusing more on risk management,” Ajit Mishra Vice President, Research, Religare Broking.

Global markets
European shares fell for the first time this week on Friday, as a 10 per cent slide in shares of brewing giant Anheuser-Busch InBev sent a shiver through investors worried about the outlook for growth and the prospect of months more wrangling over Brexit, Reuters reported.

The pan-European STOXX 600 dipped 0.2 per cent.

Asian shares trod water on Friday as investors awaited key central bank policy meetings next week amid signs of slowing global growth, while sterling extended its slide on a fresh bout of Brexit anxiety, according to a Reuters report.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was up just 0.05 per cent.