India shares higher at close of trade; Nifty 50 up 0.15%

Investing.com – India equities were higher at the close on Thursday, as gains in the Public Sector Undertakings, Metals and Oil & Gas sectors propelled shares higher.

At the close in NSE, the Nifty 50 added 0.15% to hit a new all time high, while the BSE Sensex 30 index added 0.03%.

The biggest gainers of the session on the Nifty 50 were Maruti Suzuki India Ltd. (NS:MRTI), which rose 7.39% or 532.60 points to trade at 7739.10 at the close. Bharti Infratel Ltd (NS:BHRI) added 6.56% or 14.75 points to end at 239.55 and Oil And Natural Gas Corporation Ltd (NS:ONGC) was up 4.54% or 3.85 points to 88.70 in late trade.

Biggest losers included HDFC Bank Ltd (NS:HDBK), which lost 2.11% or 29.75 points to trade at 1377.20 in late trade. Tata Consultancy Services Ltd. (NS:TCS) declined 1.46% or 40.10 points to end at 2709.45 and Bajaj Auto Ltd (NS:BAJA) shed 1.31% or 43.75 points to 3294.40.

The top performers on the BSE Sensex 30 were Maruti Suzuki India Ltd. (BO:MRTI) which rose 7.45% to 7740.15, Asian Paints Ltd. (BO:ASPN) which was up 4.08% to settle at 2410.85 and Oil And Natural Gas Corporation Ltd (BO:ONGC) which gained 4.07% to close at 88.30.

The worst performers were HDFC Bank Ltd (BO:HDBK) which was down 2.13% to 1377.05 in late trade, Tata Consultancy Services Ltd. (BO:TCS) which lost 1.46% to settle at 2709.00 and Infosys Ltd (BO:INFY) which was down 1.27% to 1126.55 at the close.

Advancing stocks outnumbered falling ones by 1187 to 465 and 67 ended unchanged; on the Bombay Stock Exchange, 1920 rose and 893 declined, while 150 ended unchanged on the India National Stock Exchange.

The India VIX, which measures the implied volatility of Nifty 50 options, was down 4.56% to 19.0000 a new 1-month low.

In commodities trading, Gold Futures for February delivery was up 0.63% or 11.45 to $1841.65 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in January fell 0.82% or 0.37 to hit $44.91 a barrel, while the February Brent oil contract fell 0.68% or 0.33 to trade at $47.92 a barrel.

USD/INR was up 0.23% to 73.927, while EUR/INR rose 0.21% to 89.5335.

The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.12% at 91.007.