Sensex closes up by 355 points in Muhurat Trading session

Mumbai, Nov 1 : Indian equity indices rebounded from a two-day decline in the Muhurat Trading session for the occasion of Samvat 2081 as Mahindra and Mahindra, Tata Motors, and Axis Bank became top contributors to the BSE's benchmark.

At closing, Sensex was up 335 points, or 0.42 per cent, at 79,724 and the Nifty was up 99 points, or 0.41 per cent, at 24,304.

Midcap and smallcap shares drove the rally.

The Nifty Midcap 100 index settled at 56,496, up 383 points, or 0.68 per cent and the Nifty Smallcap 100 index closed at 18,794, up 192 points, or 1.03 per cent.

The broader market trend was also positive during Muhurat trading.

On the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE), 3,017 stocks closed in the green, 558 in the red, and 73 closed unchanged. Twenty-five out of 30 stocks in the Sensex pack closed in the green.

Mahindra & Mahindra, Tata Motors, Axis Bank, Kotak Mahindra Bank, Nestle, NTPC, Tata Steel, IndusInd Bank, Titan, UltraTech Cement, Sun Pharma, ITC, Bajaj Finance, TCS, Maruti Suzuki, and JSW Steel were the top gainers. HCL Tech, Tech Mahindra, Wipro, ICICI Bank, and Asian Paints were the top losers.

Almost all indices except IT closed in the green.

Auto, PSU Bank, Power, Realty, Fin Services, Pharma and FMCG were major gainers.

Vikas Gupta, Manager and CEO at Omniscience Capital said: "Despite the recent fall in the markets, the optimism during the muhurat trading signifies positive investor sentiment. It is likely that the current condition in the markets is likely to start correcting itself in the next few weeks. Possibly, somewhere between November 15 to January 15, the markets should start stabilising and demonstrate a definite trend, most likely positive."

"From a medium to long-term perspective, we remain optimistic on Indian markets and expect indices to give returns in mid-double digits over 12 months period. However, from a short-term perspective, markets will be volatile and can see a 4-5 per cent correction. We prefer large-cap stocks over mid and small-cap and expect heavyweight to outperform over the next 12 months," Aditya Agarwal, Head of Derivatives & Technical Analysis at Sanctum Wealth, said.