Market benchmark Sensex today reversed its four-day fall and ended higher by over 75 points, taking comfort from encouraging corporate earnings despite lingering worries about a likely rate hike by the US Fed as early as June.
A higher opening in Europe and a mixed trend in Asia offered some respite.
Sentiment got a lift after Tata Power and National Fertilisers posted strong earnings for the March quarter, brokers said.
But the possibility of the US Federal Reserve raising borrowing costs kept investors on a leash, which capped the gains. A higher rate would temper capital flows to emerging markets, including India.
The 30-share Sensex slipped in early trade on sustained foreign fund outflows and a weakening rupee against the dollar. However, some value-buying and higher opening in Europe took the barometer to 25,305.47 at the close, up 75.11 points, or 0.30 per cent.
The gauge had fallen 549 points in the past four sessions on foreign fund outflows after regulator Sebi tightened guidelines to check any misuse of P-Notes.
Tata Power and National Fertilisers surged up to 3 per cent after their quarterly numbers for the March quarter gave investors much to cheer.
However, Jubilant FoodWorks and Britannia Industries tumbled up to 4.45 per cent today amid concerns over bread samples of virtually all top brands in Delhi reportedly containing cancer-causing chemicals.
The NSE Nifty gained 17.80 points or 0.23 per cent to 7,748.85 after shuttling between 7,761.55 and 7,715.80.
Foreign portfolio investors (FPIs) sold shares worth a net Rs 65.60 crore yesterday, as per provisional data.
Of the 30-share Sensex pack, 17 ended higher.
NTPC stayed in the lead, up 2.03 per cent, followed by Tata Motors (1.70 per cent), ICICI Bank (1.56 per cent) and HDFC (1.33 per cent).
Among BSE sectoral and industry indices, auto rose by 0.32 per cent followed by banking 0.28 per cent and FMCG 0.18 per cent. Oil and gas fell 1.01 per cent and healthcare shed (0.88 per cent).
However, broader markets showed a downward trend as small-cap and mid-cap indices slumped by 0.65 per cent and 0.16 per cent, respectively.
Japan's Nikkei ended 0.94 per cent higher while China's Shanghai Composite closed 0.77 per cent up while Hong Kong's Hang Seng closed 0.11 per cent higher.
European shares climbed after a drop in the euro helped boost European stocks as investors weighed implications of a possible Federal Reserve interest rate increase. Key indices, like France and the UK rose by up to 1.35 per cent.
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Ambit Investment Advisors CEO Andrew Holland, who hails from Britain and has been active in Indian equity markets since 2006, said "Brexit is a huge negative outcome and has far reaching ramifications for global markets and economies."
He also raised concern that some other countries may hold their own referendums and concerns would rise as to whether the European Union will disintegrate.
"The global and market implications for this are very negative and volatility across all asset classes will be high for some time going forward.
"We could therefore re-visit the concerns of earlier this year that the global economy could now take a shift down and central banks have fired most of their ammunition and anyways it is not really working. So politics will be at the forefront of markets and with that huge volatility."
Pankaj Sharma, Head of Equities, Equirus Securities, said the Brexit outcome is a surprise and it is completely opposite of what the markets were factoring in even as late as few hours back.
"We think the markets would show a huge negative reaction to this vote and we would not really be surprised if the Indian equity markets correct by 2.5-3 per cent at the least.
"We would also expect a negative impact on affected local currencies and that would mean that Rupee would also be volatile."
He further said the exposure is significant for sectors like IT and Pharma and specific names in autos, and there would be negative impact on these names as well.
"But, more than anything else, it is a disastrous outcome for an already fragile global economy and that would make task of recovery even more difficult in larger economies of the world like China and US. Perhaps the only silver lining we can see in an otherwise gloomy outcome is that you can rule out the Fed rate hike at least for the calendar year 2016.
