Sharemasterindia.com: The Sensex jumped 246 points to close at 25,857 and Nifty advanced 83 points to settle at 7,872 on the back of broad-based buying.
Sentiment on Dalal Street was boosted after the wholesale inflation fell at a faster-than-expected annual rate of 4.95 per cent in August, its tenth straight decline, mainly driven by lower fuel prices, government data showed.
In comparison, wholesale inflation fell 4.05 per cent in July. Economists in an NDTV poll estimated wholesale inflation to fall 4.36 per cent in August.
Calls for a rate cut have grown louder after annual economic growth slowed to 7 per cent in the April-June quarter from 7.5 per cent in the previous quarter. Arvind Panagariya, the vice chairman of Niti Aayog, last week said the economy needed 50-100 bps of rate cuts. Similar calls were made by business leaders at a meeting with Prime Minister Narendra Modi last Tuesday.
Buying was visible across the board. Metal stocks were in high demand in trades today, the BSE metal index advanced 2.7 per cent. Power, banking, oil & gas realty and healthcare indices also jumped over 1-2 per cent each.
From the Nifty-50 basket of stocks, NTPC was the top gainer; the stock advanced 5.2 per cent to Rs 126. Vedanta, Tata Steel, Tata Power, BPCL, Hindalco, Axis Bank and Asian Paints were also among the gainers, up 3-4.4 per cent each.
On the other hand, Cairn India, Idea Cellular, Bajaj Auto, Maruti Suzuki and HUL were among the notable losers.
The broader markets were in-line with the benchmark indices. The BSE mid-cap and small-cap indices jumped around 1 per cent each.
The overall breadth was positive as 1,698 stocks advanced while 955 declined.
3:13 p.m.: Sensex surges 281 points to 25,892 and Nifty advances 89 points to 7,878 led by gains in ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank, Axis Bank, HDFC, State Bank of India and Infosys.
3:10 p.m.: Bank Nifty advances 1.8 per cent; Canara Bank, Axis Bank, Bank of India, Bank of Baroda, Yes Bank, Punjab National Bank and State Bank of India among the top gainers, up 2-3 per cent each.
3:06 p.m.: Buying was visible across the sectors. Banking, metal, power, realty and healthcare stocks were witnessing buying interest. BSE metal index was the top sectoral gainers, up 2.65 per cent.
