Market opens at record high; RIL, HDFC Bank top gainers

MUMBAI: Market benchmarks Sensex and Nifty opened at record peaks on Monday tracking strong quarterly results by index heavyweights Reliance Industries and HDFC Bank.

After rallying over 300 points to hit a fresh lifetime high of 42,273.87, the 30-share BSE index pared gains to trade 31.32 points or 0.07 per cent higher at 41,976.69.

Similarly, the broader NSE Nifty scaled an all-time high of 12,430.50, up 12,430.50 points or 0.63 per cent.

It, too, pared early gains to trade marginally higher.

PowerGrid was the top gainer in the Sensex pack, rallying up to 4 per cent, followed by ITC, Asian Paints, M&M and HDFC.

Shares of Reliance Industries (RIL) and HDFC Bank jumped up to 2 per cent in early session following the announcement of their corporate earnings over the weekend.

RIL on Friday posted a record quarterly net profit of Rs 11,640 crore as a turnaround in oil refining business together with the continued rise in the share of its consumer businesses of retail and telecom countered lower profitability in petrochemicals.

HDFC Bank on Saturday reported a 32.8 per cent growth in net profit to Rs 7,416.5 crore for the third quarter ended December 31 driven by interest and non-interest income.

On the other hand, TCS was the top laggard, shedding over 1 per cent, after the country’s largest software exporter reported a flat December quarter net profit at Rs 8,118 crore and also made it clear that it will not be able to notch a double-digit revenue growth in 2019-20.

HCL Tech, Kotak Bank and Hero MotoCorp too fell up to 1.44 per cent.

According to traders, domestic investors are reacting to corporate results released after market hours last week, and also booking profits at higher levels.

Bourses in Shanghai, Tokyo and Seoul were trading on a positive note in their early sessions, while Hong Kong was in the red.

Brent crude oil futures rose 0.14 per cent to USD 65.59 per barrel.

Meanwhile, the rupee was trading flat at 71.06 against the US dollar in morning session.

In the previous session, Sensex settled 12.81 points, or 0.03 per cent, higher at 41,945.37, while the Nifty ended 3.15 points, or 0.03 per cent, down at 12,352.35.

Meanwhile, on a net basis, foreign institutional investors bought equities worth Rs 264.26 crore, while domestic institutional investors offloaded shares worth Rs 500.17 crore on Friday, data available with stock exchanges showed.