Stock market: Sensex jumps 343 pts, Nifty tops 25,700; Infosys, Tech Mahindra lead gainers

Domestic equity benchmarks Sensex and Nifty opened on a positive note on Friday after markets remained shut on Thursday due to municipal corporation elections in Maharashtra. Investor focus has now shifted to heavyweight Reliance Industries, set to announce its quarterly results later in the day.

At 9:16 am, the BSE Sensex rose 155.92 points, or 0.19%, to 83,538.63 after gaining nearly 343 points in early trade. The NSE Nifty edged up 19 points, or 0.07%, to 25,684.60, after briefly touching a high of 25,743.25.  

Among Sensex constituents, Asian Paints advanced 3.76% to Rs 1659.25. Tech Mahindra gained 2.39%, while Mahindra & Mahindra, Trent and Adani Ports rose 1.52%, 0.78% and 0.76%, respectively.

Asian markets traded mostly in red. At last check, Japan’s Nikkei 225 was trading 0.44% lower at 53,874.59, while South Korea’s Kospi gained 0.99% to 4,845.03. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index was down 0.25% to 26,855.01.

Wall Street ended higher overnight, with all three major indices closing in the green. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.60% to 49,442.44, while the S&P 500 edged up 0.26% to close at 6,944.47. The tech-savvy Nasdaq Composite gained 0.25% to settle at 23,530.02.

Meanwhile, on Wednesday, the Sensex settled 244.98 points, or 0.29% lower, at 83,382.71, while the Nifty declined 66.70 points, or 0.26 per cent, to end at 25,665.60.

VK Vijayakumar, Chief Investment Strategist at Geojit Investments Limited, said that the market is likely to witness a ‘directionless drift’ in the near term due to a lack of significant triggers.

Vijayakumar said that while the absence of a timeline on the US Supreme Court ruling has averted immediate global volatility, domestic cues remain mixed. "The market is likely to respond to the major Q3 results that will continue to flow in. Better-than-expected results will trigger stock-specific action but these are unlikely to take the market as a whole to significantly higher levels," he said.