Sensex surges over 500 pts in early trade; Nifty tops 14,680

The BSE benchmark Sensex rebounded over 500 points in the opening session on Monday as investors cheered the domestic economy returning to growth in the October-December period after two quarters of contraction. The 30-share gauge was trading at 49,608.97, showing a gain of 508.98 points or 1.04 per cent in early session. While the broader NSE Nifty was trading higher by 153.15 points or 1.05 per cent at 14,682.30 in opening deals.

The Sensex rally was driven by gains across the board as 27 constituents were trading in the green. On Friday, the BSE Sensex had crashed 1,939.32 points or 3.80 per cent to end at 49,099.99 – its worst one-day fall since May 4 last year. Similarly, the broader NSE Nifty had plunged 568.20 points or 3.76 per cent to close the session at 14,529.15 – the biggest single-day drop since March 23 last year.

Meanwhile, foreign investors sold equities worth Rs 8,295.17 crore on a net basis on Friday, as per exchange data. Elsewhere in Asia on Monday, shares were trading higher in afternoon trade amid some stability in bond markets after last week’s turmoil. Further, progress in the US stimulus package also lent some support to investor sentiments globally.

Meanwhile, the global oil benchmark Brent crude was trading 0.58 per cent lower at USD 65.59 per barrel. Analysts said, the high-frequency indicators were pointing towards the fact that the domestic economy is slowly entering the recovery path. After two consecutive quarters of contraction, the Indian economy has finally entered an expansionary path. The Gross Domestic Product (GDP) grew 0.4 per cent in the October-December 2020 period compared with the same period a year back, data released by the National Statistics Office on Friday showed.