Sensex, Nifty open higher as Reliance gains and crude oil prices ease
Benchmark equity indices opened marginally higher on Thursday Aug 6th, supported by buying in Reliance Industries and easing crude oil prices, despite weak cues from most Asian markets.
The BSE Sensex rose 201.43 points to 78,782.43 in early trade, while the NSE Nifty gained 16.35 points to 24,641.
Reliance Industries, Titan, Eternal, Bharat Electronics, State Bank of India and Asian Paints led the gains on the Sensex. Power Grid, Trent, Mahindra & Mahindra and Axis Bank traded lower.
Brent crude, the global oil benchmark, slipped 0.13 per cent to USD 79.35 a barrel, providing support to market sentiment.
The gains came a day after the Reserve Bank of India kept the repo rate unchanged at 5.25 per cent for a fourth straight policy meeting and retained its "neutral" stance, while raising its GDP growth forecast for the current financial year to 6.7 per cent and trimming its inflation projection to 5 per cent.
RBI Governor Sanjay Malhotra said future policy decisions on interest rates and the policy stance would remain data dependent.
Meanwhile, benchmark indices have shown divergent trends since Monday after stock exchanges introduced the Closing Auction Session (CAS), a new mechanism to determine closing prices of stocks with futures and options contracts through an auction-based process.
Elsewhere in Asia, South Korea's Kospi, Japan's Nikkei 225 and Hong Kong's Hang Seng traded lower, while Shanghai's SSE Composite edged higher. US markets ended mostly lower overnight.
Foreign institutional investors sold equities worth Rs 943.42 crore on Wednesday, according to exchange data.
On Wednesday, the Sensex closed 152.05 points, or 0.19 per cent, higher at 78,581, while the Nifty gained 9.75 points, or 0.04 per cent, to settle at 24,624.65.
