Stocks pick up from last week’s fall; National Stock Exchange indices in the green

All sectoral indices at the National Stock Exchange were in the green with Nifty realty and metal gaining by 1.9% each

Mumbai: Equity benchmark indices reversed last week's losses during early hours on Monday as investors got some respite as GDP numbers were slightly ahead of estimates with green shoots on the manufacturing side seeing better traction.

The economy expanded by 4.7% in the October to December quarter, a marginal increase from 4.5% in the previous quarter but in line with expectations.

At 10:15 am, the BSE S&P Sensex was up by 504 points or 1.32% to 38,802 while the Nifty 50 edged higher by 147 points at 11,349.

All sectoral indices at the National Stock Exchange were in the green with Nifty realty and metal gaining by 1.9% each, pharma by 1.7 per cent, IT by 1.3% and FMCG by 1.1%.

Among stocks, ICICI Bank added gains of 3.8% at Rs 516.15 per share. Metal major Vedanta and JSW Steel were up by 2.6% each while FMCG major Nestle India ticked up by 2.3%.

Eicher Motors, Hero MotoCorp, HCL Technologies and UPL gained by over 2.3% each.

Meanwhile, Asian shares steadied as investors placed their hopes on a coordinated global monetary policy response to contain the damaging economic impact of coronavirus epidemic.

Reports said pandemic fears wiped more than $5 trillion from global share value last week.

Chinese shares opened higher with the blue-chip index up by 1.5%. MSCI's broadest index of Asia Pacific shares outside Japan advanced by 0.4% while Japan's Nikkei too climbed up 0.4%.