A final hour spurt in buying in banking, auto, infra and metal counters lifted the benchmark Nifty to a new closing high of 6,817.65 today.
The market traded mostly in a narrow range but a late surge led it to hit a new peak of 6,825.45 before it lost some ground and ended with modest gains.
Investor sentiment continued to remain positive on good FII inflows and hopes of a business-friendly Government after elections. The bourse also witnessed a tinge of short- covering ahead of F&O expiry of April contracts on Wednesday.
The 50-share Nifty of the National Stock Exchange (NSE) hovered between a high of 6,825.45 and a low of 6,786.90, before settling at 6,817.65 points, up 38.25 points, or 0.56 per cent, over its last close.
Metals shares surged after the Supreme Court lifted one-and-half year old mining ban in Goa. Sesa Sterlite zoomed 4.64 per cent. Among others, L&T rose 4.22 per cent, M&M 3.63 per cent and PNB gained 3.29 per cent.
However, Wipro dropped by 6.77 per cent on lower revenue guidance for the current fiscal.
Meanwhile, Foreign institutional investors (FIIs) bought shares worth a net Rs 433.40 crs on last Thursday, as per provisional data from the stock exchanges.
Other gainers were Bharti Airtel, BPCL, SBIN, Axis Bank, BHEL and Coal India. Consumer giant HUL, Cairn, DLF and Power Grid were some of the key losers.
Turnover in the cash segment fell to Rs 12,740.10 crore from Rs 14,266.87 crore last Thursday. A total of 7,211.57 lakh shares changed hands in 56,23,843 trades, while market capitalisation stood at Rs 74,83,237 crore.
