Sensex, Nifty jump for 5th straight session: What's fuelling this rally?

Indian equity benchmarks extended their winning for the fifth consecutive session in Monday's trade even as Asian shares slipped. The surge was largely supported by gains in banks and financials stocks on strong March 2025 quarter (Q4 FY25) results. Last checked, the 30-share BSE Sensex pack soared 852 points to trade at 79,405, while the broader NSE Nifty index climbed 274 points to 24,125 level.

Banking shares surged following 'better-than-expected' results from index heavyweights HDFC Bank and ICICI Bank. Sub-index Nifty Bank topped the 55,400 mark for the first time ever as the banking gauge touched a record high of 55,422.

"Numbers from HDFC Bank and ICICI Bank have been much better than what the Street expected. These are positive sentiment drivers. Going ahead, April-June 2025 (Q1 FY26) will be a much better quarter going ahead. It is a 'buy-on-decline' market but one needs to be selective with their approach," Avinash Gorakshakar, Director of Research at ProfitMart Securities, told Business Today.

In terms of tariffs, Gorakshakar said there's a rising expectation that negotiations could now happen within the 90-day pause period given by US President Donald Trump. "Most importantly, the Indian rupee has stabilised a bit. The Dollar index has come below $100," he added.

Equity research firm Equinomics said the US and Chinese economies could be impacted much more than the Indian economy due to the ongoing trade war over the short term. "We believe that aggressive tariffs on Chinese goods by the US should favour FIIs (foreign institutional investors) money coming back to India. We think the Indian equity market will outperform the global average in the short term," it stated.

Back home, Prashanth Tapse, Senior VP (Research) at Mehta Equities, said the market sentiment turned optimistic with FIIs emerging as net buyers last week, pumping in Rs 14,670.10 crore. FIIs bought Rs 4,667.94 crore worth of shares on a net basis during the previous session, while domestic institutional investors (DIIs) sold Rs 2,006.15 crore worth of equity.

Nifty outlook

"For Nifty50, the strategy should be to buy between 23,650 and 23,550, with a stop loss at 23,500 on a closing basis," said Shrikant Chouhan, Head of Equity Research at Kotak Securities.