Equities staged a stunning turnaround to snap its two-day bearish run on bourses as the benchmark Nifty soared by a healthy 116 points to reclaim the significant 7,600 milestone amid an ambience of optimism.
Domestic sentiment turned buoyant on expectations of good monsoon this year as retail investors lapped up shares in beaten down counters.
With just few weeks to go for the Met Department's much awaited monsoon forecast, the government today said after two years of deficient rainfall monsoon this year is expected to be normal.
"El nino condition is declining. It is expected that La Nina will takeover and will perhaps favour a good monsoon this year," Agriculture Secretary Shobhana K Patnaik said.
PSU bank predominantly spreaheaded the upmove after the RBI issued guidelines last week about priority sector loans, whereby banks can buy and sell such credits to manage their priority sector lending requirements.
IT frontline counters also attracted huge buying interest ahead of Q4 earnings seasons which starts on Friday with Infosys' results.
Overcoming early choppy sideways trading range, key indices rebounded in afternoon trade with strong closing in other Asian markets and firm European peers giving a helping hand.
Markets are now focused on upcoming fourth quarter earnings season beginning next week, a floor trader commented.
Although earnings expectations for Q4 doesn't paint a rosy picture either in the midst of lacklustre economic growth and weak global demand, he added.
The 50-share Nifty index resumed higher at 7,577.80 and fluctuated widely between 7,678.80 and 7,516.85 before ending at 7,671.40, revealing a solid gain of 116.20 points, or 1.54 per cent.
Among the sectoral movers, PSU Bank shot-up (3.05 per cent), Infra (2.50 per cent), Auto (2.23 per cent), Technology (2.10 per cent), Realty (1.73 per cent), Metal (1.90 per cent) Nifty Bank (1.51 per cent), Energy (0.90 per cent), FMCG (0.70 per cent) and Pharma (0.11 per cent).
In the broader market, the NSE Midcap and Smallcap indices were up 0.86 per cent and 0.73 per cent, respectively.
Biggest gainers were TCS, Tata Motors, Infosys, ITC, Bosch, HDFC Bank, Bharti Infratel, Idea, Adani Ports, ICICI Bank, SBI, L&T, Bharti Artel, Axis Bank, Wipro and HUL.
The notable losers included Lupin, Dr Reddys, Cipla, Ambuja Cements and Ultratechcement.
Turnover in cash segment rose to Rs 15,163.13 crore compared to Rs 12,954.56 crore last Friday.
A total of 7,999.07 lakh shares changed hands in 64,51,198 trades. The market capitalisation of the NSE stood at Rs 93,20,760 crore.
