Indian equities rose sharply on Thursday amid strength across global markets after an inflation reading from the US eased growing concerns about steep hikes in COVID-era interest rates. Gains across sectors pushed the headline indices higher, with IT and financial shares being the biggest contributors.
Both main gauges jumped as much as 1.1 percent in early deals after a gap-up start. The Sensex gained 667.7 points to touch 59,485 at the strongest level of the day so far, and the Nifty50 climbed to as high as 17,719.3, up 184.6 points from its previous close.
All stocks but one in the Nifty50 basket began the day in the green. Eicher, Coal India, Bajaj Finserv, Wipro and Infosys were the top gainers.
Tech Mahindra, Tata Motors, Hindalco, HDFC Bank, TCS and HCL Tech were also among the top blue-chip gainers.
Divi's Labs — down 0.2 percent at the open — was the only laggard in the 50-scrip pack.
The near-term texture of the market is bullish but may not sustain for two reasons, said VK Vijayakumar, Chief Investment Strategist at Geojit Financial Services.
"Market valuations are high, which will attract profit booking, and details of data reveals that US inflation is unlikely to drift down steadily since wage growth and rents continue to rise. The Fed may continue to be hawkish impacting market optimism," he said.
Coal India shares rose nearly three percent, a day after the state-run miner reported a set of quarterly results that exceeded Street estimates.
Overall market breadth favoured the bulls, as 1,915 stocks rose and 1,146 fell on BSE.
Global markets
Equities in other Asian markets surged following a strong session on Wall Street overnight, with MSCI's broadest index of Asia Pacific shares outside Japan quoting up 1.2 percent in early hours. The Japanese market was shut for a holiday.
S&P 500 futures were up 0.2 percent. On Wednesday, the three main US indices surged 2-3 percent.
