Sensex gained 335.06 points to close at 79,724.12 while Nifty settled at 24,299.55, up 94.20 points, as the stock exchanges held the customary Diwali Muhurat Trading session on Friday evening.
At 6 pm, Sensex began by adding 447.90 points to reach 79,836.96 on the Bombay Stock Exchange (BSE). On the National Stock Exchange (NSE), Nifty began at 24,355.45 or 150.10 points higher.
Among BSE stocks, Mahindra & Mahindra opened by rising 2.66%, Adani Ports 1.42%, and Tata Motors by 1.35 per cent. NTPC, Axis Bank, Titan, IndusInd Bank, Tata Steel, HDFC Bank, Reliance Industries and Bharti Airtel also advanced.
Meanwhile, at the NSE, the bell ringing ceremony that opens the Muhurat Trading there, was performed by actors Raashii Khanna, Riddhi Dogra, and Vikrant Massey.
The special one-hour trading session was preceded by a pre-market trading session, from 5:45 pm till 6 pm. Also, as is the case for festivals, there was no regular trading on the day.
What is Muhurat trading?
A symbolic practice, It marks the commencement of a new Hindu calendar year, the latest being Samvat 2081. The session is for the market segments that include equity, commodity derivatives, currency derivatives, equity futures and options (F&O), securities lending and borrowing (SLB), and so on, all within that slot.
For the Samvat year 2080 that ended on Thursday, the BSE Sensex jumped 14,484.38 points while the Nifty climbed 4,780 points.
Global markets were mixed as European shares rose in early trade. Most Asian markets closed with losses.
Japan’s benchmark Nikkei 225 dropped 2.6%, the Shanghai Composite slipped 0.2% and South Korea’s Kospi lost 0.5%. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index added 0.9%.