Mumbai, Oct 4 (IANS) A benchmark index of Indian equities markets Thursday closed above the 19,000-mark on hopes of more economic reforms to be announced by the government.
Strong cues from other Asian markets and good inflows of foreign capital also helped boost sentiment at Dalal Street. Realty, capital goods and banking stocks were the best performers.
The 30-scrip sensitive index (Sensex) of the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), which opened at 18,939.75 points, closed at 19,065.38 points (provisional), 195.69 points or 1.04 percent higher in afternoon trade than its previous day's close at 18,869.69 points.
The Sensex touched a high of 19,107.04 points and a low of 18,939.75 points in intra-day trade. The BSE midcap index was up 27.23 points while the smallcap index was up 26.37 points.
The wider 50-scrip S&P CNX Nifty of the National Stock Exchange closed 1.06 percent up at 5,791.85 points.
This came ahead of a meeting of the cabinet that is likely to decide on opening up the pension sector to foreign investment, raising the FDI cap in insurance sector to 49 percent from the current 26 percent, increasing urea prices, and approve the creation of a National Investment Board.
On the sectoral front, the BSE realty index was up 94.57 points followed by the consumer durable index, up 174.88 points, and banking index up 257.22 points.
Major Sensex gainers were BHEL, up 7.03 percent at Rs.267.20; ICICI Bank, up 3.13 percent at Rs.1,085.80; SBI, up 2.27 percent at Rs.2,347.70; Dr Reddys Lab, up 2.24 percent at Rs.1,719.50; and ITC, up 2.02 percent at Rs.275.75.
The main losers were Cipla, down 4.36 percent at Rs.364.50; Mahindra and Mahindra, down 1.24 percent at Rs.859.05; Hero MotoCorp, down 1.19 percent at Rs.1,828; Bajaj Auto, down 1.12 percent at Rs.1,763.85; and Coal India, down 0.85 percent at Rs.361.85.
Among other Asian markets, Japan's Nikkei closed 0.89 percent up while Hong Kong's Hang Seng ended trading 0.09 percent higher. Shanghai's composite index also closed 1.45 percent up.
At closing bell here, European markets were, however, trading in red. Both France's CAC and Germany's DAX were down 0.28 percent. Britain's FTSE 100 was trading 0.18 percent lower.
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