SENSEX rises over 250 points, NIFTY50 reclaims 24,000 led by ICICI Bank, Infosys

The Indian equity benchmarks edged higher after staging a flat start on Wednesday, June 17, powered by gains in index heavyweights like Infosys, ICICI Bank, Trent, Eternal, Mahindra & Mahindra and Sun Pharma. The SENSEX rose as much as 285 points and NIFTY50 index touched an intraday high of 24,067.

As of 9:50 am, the SENSEX was up 259 points at 77,063 and NIFTY50 index rose 70 points to 24,058.

Asian markets were trading on a subdued note as investors turned cautious about US Federal Reserve's near-term outlook on interest rates as market participants were divided on cuts to hikes in rates in coming months.

Japan's Nikkei rose 0.7%, China's Shanghai Composite declined 0.14%, Hong Kong's Hang Seng slipped 0.02% and South Korea's KOSPI fell 0.11%.

US stocks ended mixed on Tuesday as Dow Jones closed at record high while S&P 500 and tech heavy Nasdaq ended lower following a selloff in technology shares.

The Dow Jones rose 0.64%, S&P 500 index declined 0.57% and tech heavy Nasdaq dropped 1.15%.

Back home, nine of 15 major sector gauges compiled by the National Stock Exchange (NSE) were trading higher led by the NIFTY IT index's 1.34% gain, NIFTY Consumer Durables, FMCG, Media and Consumer Durables indices also rose between 0.3% and 1.5%.

On the other hand, auto, bank, real estate, metal and PSU banking shares were facing selling pressure.

Broader markets were outperforming their larger peers as NIFTY Midcap 100 index rose 0.23% and NIFTY Smallcap 100 index advanced 0.5%.

Trent was top gainer in the NIFTY50 index, the stock rose 3.3% to ₹2,993. Eternal, Tech Mahindra, Infosys, Tata Consultancy Services, Wipro, HCL Tech, Apollo Hospitals and Nestle India also rose between 0.8% and 1.85%.

On the flip side, Tata Motors PV, ONGC, Adani Ports, Axis Bank, Cipla, Dr Reddy's Labs, NTPC and Bajaj Finance were top losers in the NIFTY50 index.

The overall market breadth was positive as 1,942 shares were advancing while 849 were declining on the NSE.