Despite rising inflation and weak housing data from the US, India’s key equity indices witnessed a pull-back rally on Friday. It was the good earning numbers posted by some companies that boosted the markets. The barometer Sensex of the Bombay Stock exchange (BSE ), for the first time since the Budget, managed to close above the 17K mark. The 30-share index on Friday closed at 17,125.98 points, gaining 404.90 points, or 2.42%. The broader S&P CNX Nifty also closed above the psychological mark of 5K mark at 5,111.70, surging 111.85 points or 2.24%.
For the first time in the near past, Sensex closed in the positive territory on a weekly basis consecutively for the third week on Friday, surging by 3.91%. Nifty rose 3.09% in the week. Anmol Sekhri, fund manager at Bonanza Portfolio Ltd said, ?The markets? movement today clearly given an indication that it is out of the woods. We expect the market to rise for some time and stabilise thereafter. However, with the rising inflation, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) could play a spoilsport. But valuations seem reasonable and resilience has been confirmed.”
India’s headline inflation rate, as measured by the Wholesale Price Index (WPI), rose 7.33% for the week ending on April 12 from 7.14% a week ago. Experts also believe that following the hike in CRR by the RBI, there seems to be a remote possibility of the apex bank hiking any other key rates in its annual policy to be unveiled n April 29. This led to robust demand in the banking sector stocks.
However, Asian markets ended the day on a mixed note. The Hong Kong Hang Seng fell by 164 points, or 2.38%, to close at 25,516.78 points while Japan’s Nikkei surged by 2.38%, or 322.60, points to end the day at 13,863.47 points.
The US markets on Thursday reacted negatively to the slump in the US housing sales data but better-than-expected employment data helped the markets close on slightly lesser negative terrain.
Banking and tech stocks hogged the lime light on Friday with BSE Bankex surging 286.03 points, or 3.3%, to close at 8,868.08 points while the BSE Tech index gained 104.14 points, or 3.16%, to close at 3,395.54 points.
