Bulls dominate Sensex & Nifty; Rites gains 6 per cent, ONGC jumps 5 per cent, Bharti Airtel slips

Bulls have made a comeback as the domestic benchmark indices rallied on Monday, starting the last month of the financial year FY21 with a 'boom'. Sensex surged 749.85 points or 1.53 per cent to close at 49,849.84 levels while Nifty jumped 232.40 points or by 1.6 per cent to settle at 14,761.55 levels. 

During today's trading session, the metal and auto stocks rallied along with gains, which were witnessed in the PSU stocks. 

In the global markets, China’s official manufacturing Purchasing Managers’ Index (PMI) for the month of February 2021 came in at 50.6, indicating growth at a slower pace compared to January’s reading of 51.3.  

Despite the news, in the Asian markets, Shanghai Composite index surged 1.21 per cent while Japan's Nikkei index gained 2.41 per cent. Meanwhile, soon after the announcements of making changes to the index were made such as increasing the number of index constituents to 80 companies from the current 52 along with limiting a stock’s weighting to 8 per cent, Hong Kong's Hang Seng index witnessed a rise by 1.63 per cent. On the other hand, South Korea's KOSPI index tumbled 2.80 per cent as sell-off continued in the local Korean markets. 

In the European markets, indices gained on growth optimism. Also, the concerns regarding an increase in inflation seemed to have cooled down as bond markets stabilised post a wobbly Friday's session. Improved UK manufacturing data also supported gains as FTSE 100, DAX, and CAC 40 were trading higher by 1.55 per cent, 1.15 per cent, and 1.51 per cent, respectively. 

Sensex gainers included Power Grid that jumped 5.94 per cent, ONGC surged 5.40 per cent, UltraTech Cement zoomed by 4.30 per cent, Asian Paints gained 3.76 per cent, Kotak Mahindra Bank inched higher by 3.53 per cent, Titan Company climbed 3.25 per cent, HDFC went up by 2.69 per cent, etc.  

In Sensex basket, Bharti Airtel was the only scrip, which ended the day in the red, declining by 4.45 per cent. 

Amongst sectoral indices on BSE, the Basic Materials index was the biggest gainer, up by 2.91 per cent while the Telecom index was the biggest loser, declining by 3.41 per cent.