Market wrap: RIL, HDFC, TCS power 673-point Sensex rally; Nifty tops 17,800

Top headlines
 
·       RIL, HDFC, TCS power 673-point rally for Sensex; Nifty tops 17,800
·       Sugar stocks rally on strong outlook; Triveni, Balrampur hit new highs
·       Two Tata Group stocks zoom over 2,400% in one year
·       Vedanta slides over 6% after announcing aluminium output Oct-Dec quarter
 
The key benchmark indices rallied for a third straight day today as investors looked past the surging coronavirus cases in the country. After erasing morning gains and hitting a low of 59,084 in early deals, bulls lifted the BSE Sensex index over 853 points from the day's low. The index finally settled 673 points, or 1.14 per cent, higher at 59,856. Its NSE counterpart Nifty50, too, zoomed 181 points to settle above the 17,800-mark at 17,807.
 
NTPC, which gained over 5 per cent, was the top Nifty gainer. It was followed by ONGC, PowerGrid, SBI, Titan and RIL. On the downside, Tata Motors, Coal India, Sun Pharma, Shree Cement, and Tata Consumer Products capped the upsides for the index.
 
The broader markets, on the other hand, underperformed the benchmarks by a wide margin. The BSE MidCap and SmallCap indices ended with small gains of 0.05 per cent and 0.4 per cent, respectively.
 
Sectorally, banking shares were largely responsible for the up move throughout the day. The Nifty Bank index closed 1.2% up, led by gains in SBI, Axis Bank, Kotak Bank, ICICI Bank and HDFC Bank. Another winner was the Oil & Gas index, which closed 1.3% higher. ONGC, Reliance, Gujarat Gas, GAIL, and IOC clocked gains ranging between 0.9 and 4%.
 
The IT index, which was an underperformer in the early part of the day, also recouped losses and closed in the positive zone. Pharma, on the other hand, could not recover and ended 0.8% lower.
 
The shares of sugar companies were also in demand. They rallied as much as 20 per cent amid heavy volumes on a strong outlook. Triveni Engineering & Industries soared over 12 per cent, crossing its previous high level hit on December 28 on the BSE.
 
Similarly, Balrampur Chini Mills surged over 14% to touch a new record high level. Others such as Dwarikesh Sugar and Uttam Sugar closed 20% higher on the BSE. Rating agency CRISIL expects sugar mills to see improvement in both revenue and profitability in the 2022 season on the back of a 16-17 per cent rise in sugar prices.
 
That apart, among stocks, share prices of Tata group companies Tata Teleservices Maharashtra and Automotive Stampings & Assembles were locked at the 5% upper circuit on the BSE. The stock prices of the two companies have zoomed over 2,400 per cent in the past one year, as against a 23% rise in the Sensex during this period.
 
On the down side, mining major Vedanta was among the top losers as the stock crashed over 6% on the BSE. Investors seemed to have been unimpressed with the company's aluminium output numbers for the Oct-Dec quarter. The company said it produced 579,000 tonnes of cast metal aluminium at its smelters in the December quarter, a 16 per cent rise from a year ago, but only a marginal jump of 2 per cent over the previous quarter. The Lanjigarh refinery, meanwhile, produced 472,000 tonnes of alumina, 8% less than in the preceding quarter.