Indian equity shares rose for a third consecutive session on Monday on sustained fund inflows amid positive global cues.

NSE index marked its highest level in nearly 1-1/2 months as Wipro surged on strong earnings, while lenders gained on continued optimism the central bank's surprise rate cut last week would revive credit growth.

Earnings by blue-chips such as ITC on Wednesday and ECB's decision on its widely-expected quantitative easing programme on Thursday are seen as the next key triggers.

The broader NSE index closed higher by 36.9 points or 0.43 per cent at 8,550.70, after earlier touching its highest intra-day level since December 5.

The benchmark BSE index ended up 140.12 points or 0.5 per cent at 28,262.01, after rising to its highest since December 8.

Wipro rose 5.3 per cent after the country's third-largest IT services exporter on Friday reported better-than-expected growth in December-quarter net profit.

However, Hindustan Unilever fell 5.2 per cent, its biggest daily fall since July 2011, after analysts said its December-quarter net profit of Rs 1250 crore included an exceptional profit of Rs 400 crore.

Among BSE sectoral indices, consumer durables index was the star-performer and was up 3.35 per cent, followed by infrastructure 1.18 per cent, capital goods and healthcare 1.17 per cent each.

Major Sensex gainers were Wipro 5.26%, GAIL 3.73%, Axis Bank 2.67%, BHEL 2.57% and Tata Motors 2.5%, while the top five losers were HUL 5.27%, Hero MotoCorp 1.9%, HDFC 0.99%, TCS 0.87% and SBIN 0.79%.

Broker's comment

A report by SMC Investments and Advisors said: "US stocks continued to advance to the tune of appreciating dollar and incessant breaking crude oil prices. Asian stocks followed the US markets, while China declined due to weak economic data.The average asking price for a house in the United Kingdom was up 1.4 per cent on month in January. That follows the upwardly revised 2.2 per cent contraction in December (originally -3.3 percent). On a yearly basis, house prices jumped 8.2 per cent following the 7.0 per cent spike in the previous month."

Brokers said apart from heavy purchases made by foreign funds on the domestic bourses on Friday, encouraging corporate earnings and a firm trend in European markets on a strong pick-up in oil prices mainly buoyed the trading sentiment.

Global markets

European shares inched up in early trading on Monday, adding to last week's strong gains, helped by mounting expectations the European Central Bank is about to embark into a bond-buying programme to support the euro zone economy.

At 0808 GMT, the FTSEurofirst 300 index of top European shares was up 0.1 per cent at 1,408.40 points, after gaining 1 per cent on Friday.

Most Asian share markets followed Wall Street higher on Monday, though investors were wary of being disappointed yet again by economic data from China and policy stimulus in the euro zone.

Adding to the air of caution was a retreat in Chinese equities, in part on news the securities regulator had barred three major brokerages from opening new margin trading accounts for clients for three months.

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