Sensex soars by 208 points in early trade

The Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) barometer opens firm at 15,168.69 and later moves to a high of 15,200.81, a rise of 208 points over Wednesday's close of 14,993.04.

The stock markets continued to rally for the fifth straight day on Mumbai as the benchmark Sensex soared by 208 points during morning trade on the back of consistent short-covering ahead of the expiry of August series of derivatives.

HT Image

The market sentiment was bolstered by a strong global turnaround, buoyed by the release of a letter from US Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke assuring to take required steps to mitigate the adverse effects on the economy, arising from the financial market turmoil.

The Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE) barometer opened firm at 15,168.69 and later moved to a high of 15,200.81, a rise of 208 points over Wednesday's close of 14,993.04.

The 30-share index later trimmed the gains and was quoted at 15,122.65 at 10.30 am.

Similarly, the broad-based S&P CNX Nifty of the National Stock Exchange (NSE) jumped by 51.05 points to a high of 4,410.35 before being quoted at 4,388.05 at 10.30 am against previous close of 4,359.30.

The market witnessed across the board buying support, particularly short-covering by foreign institutional investors (FIIs) and operators on the concluding day of derivatives contract, brokers said.

They expected a long-term rally considering a large part of about 65 per cent roll over to derivatives next series.

Asian markets were quoted up by about 1.0 to 2.5 per cent during morning trade following a strong rally in Wall Street last night.