Sensex jumps over 350 points as FM Nirmala Sitharaman begins Budget speech, Nifty tops 21,800

Indian equity benchmarks surged in Thursday's late morning deals after Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman started the Budget 2024 presentation. The domestic indices were up today led by gains in automobile and FMCG stocks. The 30-share BSE Sensex rose 371 points or 0.52 per cent to trade at 72,124, while the NSE Nifty was up 99 points or 0.45 per cent to trade at 21,824. Broader markets (mid- and small-cap shares) were mixed as Nifty Midcap 100 fell 0.35 per cent and small-cap climbed 0.14 per cent.

BSE 500 stocks such as Godrej Consumer Products, Infibeam Avenues, Data Patterns and Dixon jumped up to 9.18 per cent. In contrast, Paytm, Gravita, KIOCL and CE Info Systems cracked up to 20 per cent.

On the global front, Asian markets were subdued after the US Federal Reserve kept rates unchanged but signalled that rate cuts would not be appropriate until inflation cools off further.

Back home, foreign institutional investors (FIIs) bought Rs 1,660.72 crore worth of shares on a net basis during the previous session and domestic institutional investors (DIIs) purchased Rs 2,542.93 crore worth of shares, exchange data showed.

Six out of the 15 sector gauges -- compiled by the NSE -- were trading in the green. Sub-indexes Nifty Auto and Nifty FMCG were outperforming the NSE platform by rising as much as 0.82 per cent and 0.48 per cent, respectively. Nifty Consumer Durables slipped 0.53 per cent.

On the stock-specific front, Eicher Motors was the top gainer in the Nifty pack as the stock soared 2.76 per cent to trade at Rs 3,945.55. M&M, Maruti, BPCL and Cipla rose up to 2.26 per cent.

In contrast, Grasim Industries, L&T, JSW Steel, LTIMindtree and ICICI Bank were among the top losers on Nifty50.

The overall market breadth was strong as 1,746 shares were advancing while 1,283 were declining on BSE.

On the 30-share BSE index, TCS, Maruti, M&M, ITC, Infosys, PowerGrid, NTPC and HUL were among the top gainers.

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