The Sensex crossed the 26,000 mark on the BSE for the second time this month after closing at 26,025.80, up 311 points or 1.21 per cent. It had earlier breached that mark on July 6 ahead of the Union Budget. The 50-share NSE index Nifty jumped 83.65 points to end at 7,767.85.

According to Raghu Kumar, Co-founder, RKSV, the trend showed that FIIs were favoring Indian market over other markets and investors were focused mostly on blue-chip stocks making up the Sensex and Nifty.

"While mid-cap and small-cap stocks stayed flat, some of the highest capitalized stocks in the market- including Tata Motors, Sun Pharma, and Lupin hit all time highs. The bullishness seems to be coming from high FII inflows. Since July 14, FII's have pumped in more than Rs 2700 crore, and the Sensex has gone up 4 per cent during these past eight days alone," he said.

"The staple benchmark Index (the Dow Jones Industrial Average) has appreciated by 3 per cent year to date while the Sensex has appreciated by 23 per cent during the same time period," he added.

The Sensex and the Nifty surged nearly 1.2 per cent at the closing session on Tuesday led by TECK, IT, oil & gas and consumer durables stocks amid firm global cues.

Sectoral indices

'Barring capital goods and power, all other BSE sectoral indices ended in the green. Among them, TECk (+2.02 per cent), IT (+1.78 per cent), oil & gas (+1.74 per cent) and consumer durables indices (+1.16 per cent) were the star-performers. On the other hand, capital goods index was down 0.69 per cent and power 0.33 per cent.

Gainers, losers

Among 30-share Sensex constituents, Bharti Airtel gained 4.81 per cent at Rs 353.25, RIL rose 3.35 per cent at Rs 1,030.80, HDFC jumped 2.93 per cent at Rs 1,040.70, TCS gained 2.71 per cent at Rs 2,531.05 and Hindalco rose 2.62 per cent at Rs 188.25.

On the other hand, Maruti fell 1 per cent at Rs 2,512. 80, L&T shed 0.92 per cent at Rs 1,654.60, M&M declined 0.51 per cent at Rs 1,178.35, BHEL slipped 0.32 per cent at Rs 234.30 and Axis Bank was down 0.27 per cent at Rs 2,017.60.

Brokers said investor sentiment was influenced by persistent inflow of foreign funds and widespread buying by retail investors amid better-than-expected first quarter earnings by blue-chip companies.

Further, improving macroeconomic indicators, monsoon progress and positive cues from global markets, supported the buoyancy in domestic indices, they said.

Foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) bought shares worth Rs 161.17 crore yesterday, as per provisional data from the stock exchanges.

European stocks rebounded after three days of losses, as European Union foreign ministers meet in Brussels to discuss sanctions against Russia. Asian shares gained amid signs that tensions over Ukraine’s crisis is easing.

The Stoxx Europe 600 Index rose 0.7 per cent to 340.13 at 9:46 a.m. in London after falling 1.5 per cent in the past three days. Standard & Poor’s 500 Index futures climbed 0.1 per cent, and the MSCI Asia Pacific Index gained 0.6 per cent.

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