Sensex, Nifty close in green; ONGC gains by nearly 6 per cent; international flights begin resuming

Following banking, energy and financial stocks, domestic benchmark indices ended the week on a positive note with Sensex rallying by 548.46 points or 1.50 per cent to settle at 37,020.14 and Nifty gaining by 161.75 points or 1.51 per cent to close at 10,901.70.

Airline stocks remained mixed despite the government granting permission for limited international flights to fly after a nearly four-month travel shutdown during the COVID-19 pandemic. Shares of InterGlobe Aviation rose by a mere 0.13 per cent while that of SpiceJet declined by 2.11 per cent on BSE. 

Globally, Asian indices such as Shanghai index and Hang Seng increased by 0.13 per cent and 0.47 per cent respectively, a day after the indices saw a drastic fall as investors booked profits in the Chinese market fearing that improved economic data will lead to tightening of security and financial measures. Japan's Nikkei index fell by 0.32 per cent whereas South Korea's KOSPI index gained by 0.80 per cent. As for European markets, FTSE100 and DAX were seen trading on a positive note, up by 0.53 per cent and 0.58 per cent respectively, while on the other hand, CAC 40 declined by 0.14 per cent. 

In the Sensex basket, 25 scrips advanced while five stocks declined. Sensex winners included ONGC rallying by 5.52 per cent, Titan Company gaining by 3.75 per cent, RIL increasing by 3.70 per cent, HDFC Bank soaring by 3.46 per cent, Mahindra & Mahindra rising by 3.19 per cent, Bajaj Finance gaining by 3.04 per cent, Tata Steel up by 2.68 per cent, etc. Sensex draggers consisted of TCS dropping by 1.45 per cent, Nestle India declining by 1.23 per cent, Infosys dipping by 0.76 per cent, HCL Technologies declining by 0.67 per cent and Axis Bank down by 0.14 per cent.

Amidst BSE sectoral gainers, the biggest gainer was Oil & Gas index, up by 5.05 per cent whereas IT index was the biggest loser, down by 0.86 per cent. BSE small-cap index and BSE mid-cap index closed in green, up by 1.11 per cent and 1.55 per cent respectively.