After opening flat with a downward bias, benchmark indices bounced up on Friday shrugging off RBI’s hawkish policy stance and weak global market trends.

The 30-share BSE benchmark which fell 262.73 points to 56,147.23 points in initial trades bounced higher later.

At 2.15 pm, the Sensex was quoted higher by 1,215.16 points at 57,625.12.

Similarly, the broader NSE Nifty which dipped 70.4 points to 16,747.70 points initially, recouped losses and went up after the RBI announced hike in repo rates by 50 bps.

At 2.15 Pm, on the NSE, the Nifty was trading higher by a whopping 345.05 points at 17,163.15 points

Top gainers, losers

Among the 30-share Sensex pack, Asian Paints, Tech Mahindra, Tata Consultancy Services, Infosys, Mahindra & Mahindra and Hindustan Unilever were the major laggards in the early trade.

However, Power Grid, HIndalco, Kotak Bank, Sun Pharma, Reliance Industries and UltraTech Cement were in the positive territory.

Elsewhere in Asia, markets in Tokyo, Shanghai and Hong Kong were quoting lower while Seoul traded higher.

The US markets had ended sharply lower on Thursday.

"Markets are expected to be volatile today. Weak global cues will continue to rupture any intra-day strength in the Nifty," Prashanth Tapse - Research Analyst, Senior VP (Research), Mehta Equities Ltd, said.

The BSE benchmark fell 188.32 points or 0.33 per cent to settle at 56,409.96 points on Thursday. The Nifty dipped 40.50 points or 0.24 per cent to end at 16,818.10 points.

FII offloads

Meanwhile, the international oil benchmark Brent crude futures dipped 0.19 per cent to $88.32 per barrel.

Foreign institutional investors offloaded shares worth Rs 3,599.42 crore on Thursday, according to data available with BSE.

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