Mumbai — A major rally in the shares of heavyweight stocks such as Infosys Technologies, Reliance Industries and HDFC Bank led a key representative market index to surge to an all-time high during intra-day trading Friday.
The 30-share sensitive index (Sensex) of the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) touched its highest-ever level of 12,741.90 points midway during the trading session Friday, surpassing its previous high of 12,671 points on May 11 this year.
In the past week, the key index has risen over 350 points, or 2.84 percent, and the gains have been an impressive 830 points, or almost seven percent, in the past month. The Sensex is up 4,356 points, or 52 percent, over the past year.
Out of the 30 shares that comprises the basket for the Sensex, as many as 23 of them had registered gains Friday, while seven recorded losses.
Infosys, which led the rally because of its weight in the Sensex, was up 1.6 percent, Reliance rose 1.4 percent, while HDFC Bank gained 3.8 percent.
Market analysts cautioned that while Friday’s rally was backed by solid second quarter results reported by some heavyweight stocks, the fundamentals allowed only short-time purchases and wait for corrections for longer positions.
“The extent of correction will reveal the kind of market we are in now. But its difficult to take a call on when precisely this correction will happen,” said Deepak Mohan, managing director of Trend Watch India.
“Given a demand slowdown in developed economics, especially the US and the EU, there are some worrying developments for Indian manufacturing companies,” added Pradeep Ganguly, an analyst with a foreign brokerage firm here.
“Manufacturing continues to lead the growth, and the worry is that the sector’s growing export-orientation may be risky,” Ganguly told IANS.