SENSEX, NIFTY50 end off day's highs as losses in Reliance, SBI outweigh gains in TCS, ICICI Bank

The Indian equity benchmarks came off intraday highs to end on a flat note as losses in Reliance Industries, State Bank of India, Bharti Airtel, ITC and HDFC Bank outweighed gains in ICICI Bank, Tata Consultancy Services, Mahindra & Mahindra, Infosys, Larsen & Toubro and Axis Bank.

The SENSEX ended 50 points higher at 82,276 and NIFTY50 index advanced 57 points to close at 25,482.

Earlier in the session, the benchmarks staged a gap up opening on the back of strong buying interest in information technology (IT) shares on account of value buying and a short covering rally, analysts noted. The SENSEX rose as much as 732 points at the day's highest level and NIFTY50 index touched an intraday high of 25,652.

Asian markets ended higher on Wednesday with Japan's Nikkei advancing 2.22% to close at a fresh all-time high and South Korea's KOSPI advanced 1.91% to hit a record high powered by gains in chip makers.

China's Shanghai Composite advanced 0.72% and Hong Kong's Hang Seng rose 0.66%.

Back home, 10 of 15 sector gauges compiled by the National Stock Exchange ended higher led by the NIFTY Metal index's 2.7% gain. NIFTY Auto, IT, Pharma and Healthcare indices also rose 1% and 1.85%.

On the flip side, select FMCG, PSU bank, realty and oil & gas shares faced selling pressure.

Broader markets outperformed their larger peers as NIFTY Midcap 100 index advanced 0.58% and NIFTY Smallcap 100 index climbed nearly 1%.

Among the individual shares, shares of solar energy companies such as Waaree Energies, Premier Energies, and Vikram Solar ended sharply lower as the Trump administration set preliminary duty of 126% on solar imports from India after determining the country "unfairly subsidised manufacturing".

HCL Technologies was top gainer in the NIFTY50 index, the stock rose 2.74% to close at ₹1,376. Bajaj Auto, Tata Steel, Shriram Finance, TCS, InterGlobe Aviation, Adani Enterprises and Sun Pharma rose between 1.8% and 2.7%.

On the other hand, Reliance Industries, State Bank of India, Adani Ports, Eternal, ITC, Bharti Airtel and Kotak Mahindra Bank were top losers in the NIFTY50 index.

The overall market breadth was neutral as 1,663 shares ended higher while 1,540 closed lower on the NSE.