Market Wrap, Oct 9: NIFTY50 above 25,100, SENSEX rises 398 points as metal, IT stocks rally; Tata Steel up over 2%

The Indian stock market ended higher on Thursday, October 9, supported by positive global cues and strong gains in metal, IT, and pharma stocks. Investor sentiment was further boosted by two consecutive days of foreign fund inflows.

The broader market also outperformed the main equity benchmark indices.

Pharmaceutical stocks gained on Thursday after reports suggested that the United States has dropped its proposal to impose tariffs on imports of generic drugs, a decision that brings major relief to Indian drugmakers, which dominate the US generic drugs market.

According to exchange data, on Wednesday, the foreign institutional investors (FIIs) purchased shares worth ₹81.28 crore, while the domestic institutional investors (DIIs) bought equities worth ₹329.96 crore on a net basis.

Globally, most Asian indices closed higher as investors ramped up bets on AI-linked stocks, while gold hovered above $4,000 and the dollar held firm near recent highs.

Japan's Nikkei was up 1.6%, and China's Shanghai Composite rose 1.3%, while Taiwan Weighted surged 0.87%. However, Hong Kong's Hang Seng ended 0.35% lower.

On Wall Street, the technology shares lifted US stocks to a higher close on Wednesday as investors awaited the Federal Reserve’s latest meeting minutes for signals on the interest rate outlook.

Tech-heavy Nasdaq rose 1.12%, S&P 500 advanced 0.58%, and Dow Jones ended unchanged.

As many as 3,191 stocks traded on the NSE on Thursday. Out of this, 1,600 advanced and 1,495 stocks declined, while 96 scrips remained unchanged.

This indicated that the market breadth was in favour of advances.

A total of 86 stocks hit their 52-week highs, while 90 stocks touched their one-year lows. Besides, 105 stocks hit their upper circuit limits, and 65 touched their lower circuit bands on Thursday.

The market capitalisation of NSE-listed firms stood at ₹457.89 lakh crore at the close of the session.

India VIX, the volatility gauge, stood at 10.12 levels, falling 1.86%.

The Nifty Smallcap 100 index surged 0.61% to end at 18,000.25 levels, while the Nifty Midcap 100 index closed at the 58,429.85 level, gaining 0.97%.

All sectoral indices closed higher, led by Nifty Metal, which surged 2.17%. Other notable gainers included Nifty IT (up 1.12%), Nifty Pharma (1.05%), Nifty Realty (0.74%), and Nifty PSU Bank (0.61%).

Tata Steel was the most contributing stock, rising 2.48%, followed by JSW Steel (2.34%), SBI Life Insurance (2.26%), HCL Technologies (2.15%) and Bharat Electronics (1.55%).

On the flip side, Axis Bank (-1.06%), Titan Company (-0.61%), Tata Consumer Products (-0.46%), Maruti Suzuki (-0.40%) and HDFC Bank (-0.38%) were the biggest laggards on the 50-share index.