Sensex moves past 48,000; Nifty at 14,100 as bulls greet 2021

Led by PSU and information technology stocks, benchmark indices made further gains to begin the first week of 2021 on a firm note. At 9:40 am, the BSE Sensex had moved up 0.47 per cent at Rs 48,095.30 on Monday and the NSE NIfty jumped 0.55 per cent or 77 points at 14,096.20. As many as 1,872 stocks were trading in the green on the BSE, as against 542 stocks, which were in the red.

However, today's star performer belonged to the metal pack.

According to analysts, record GDP collection, Covid vaccine rollout and easy liquidity from across the shores, helped the bullish sentiment.

"The advances-declines ratio is sharply in the positive, suggesting higher interest in broader markets," they said and added, as the uptrend in the market is maturing after the Nifty ended up for the ninth consecutive week, there are little signs of a reversal in the near future.

The government’s GST collection surged to an all-time high as economic activities picked up amid the festive season after the nation lifted lockdown restrictions. GST revenue for November, collected in December, stood at Rs 1.15 lakh crore.

ONGC leading from the front

PSU majors ONGC, SBI, TCS, Infosys, HCL Technologies, NTPC and PowerGrid were among the gainers in the Sensex pack. Eight stocks in the 30-share Sensex are ruling in the red. Among them, Reliance Industries was the biggest loser by 0.32 per cent at Rs 1,980.75, followed by Asian Paints, Titan Company and Bajaj Auto.

The BSE metal index jumped 2.32 per cent with SAIL, National Aluminium, NMDC, Hindalco, Vedanta, Tata Steel, JSW Steel and Hindustan ZInc gaining over two per cent.

Idea, Ashok Leyland jump

The BSE Midcap and BSE Smallcap indices outperformed the benchmark indices, with bigger gains of one per cent each. While Idea Cellular, Ashok Leyland, Federal Bank, SAIL, IDFC First Bank, Muthoot Finance, BHEL and Oil India were among the BSE MidCap gainers, shares such as Trident, Sunflag Iron & Steel, Mangalore Chemical Fertilizers, SREI Infra, MMTC, Greaves Cotton and Time Technoloplast lifted the SmallCap index.