By IANS
New Delhi : Indian equities had a dream run for the third straight day Friday, sending a key index to another all-time closing high on large-scale buying in automobile, steel, energy and telecom stocks.
The 30-share sensitive index (Sensex) of the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) closed Friday 16,564.23 points, with an impressive gain of 216.28 points or 1.32 percent over the previous day’s close at 16,347.95 points.
In the interim, the key index touched an all-time intra-day peak of 16,616.84 points. Two-thirds of the 20 shares that form the Sensex basket ended with gains, while 10 others closed with losses, data with the exchange showed.
“The Sensex has been on a dream run on the back of cuts in US Fed’s interest rates. Today, the major trigger came from the drop in India’s inflation rate to the lowest level in five years,” said an analyst with a brokerage here.
Among the sector-specific indices, that for oil and gas performed best, rising 3.55 points, followed by 1.62 percent for the tech index, 1.54 for realty and 1.28 for state-run enterprises.
On the other hand, the index for fast-moving consumer goods fell 0.59 percent, followed by 0.54 percent for healthcare and 0.34 for consumer durables, BSE data showed.
Reliance Industries, Bharti Airtel, State Bank of India, Reliance Infocomm and Reliance Energy were among the top gainers, while ITC, Hindustan Aluminium, Cipla, National Thermal Power Corp and Satyam ended in the red.