Closing Bell: Sensex ends 623 points higher, Nifty up 1.5% at 11,844 ; banking, auto stocks lead gains

Indian shares ended higher on Friday, up over 3 percent for the week, boosted by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s landslide victory in the general election with financials leading gains.

Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won 303 out of the 542 seats in the Lok Sabha elections, in what is a first back-to-back majority for a single party since 1984.

Meanwhile, Asian stock markets were mixed on Friday, with sentiment torn between investors worried that the US-China trade war was becoming more protracted, and others hope that the world’s two largest economies would reach a settlement soon.

The Sensex settled 623 points higher at 39,435, while the Nifty50 added 187 points to end at 11,844. Among broader markets, both the Nifty Midcap and the Nifty Smallcap indices rose 2.2 percent and 2.6 percent, respectively.

ICICI Bank, Vedanta, Tata Steel, Bharti Airtel and Zee were among the major gainers on the Nifty50, whereas Tech Mahindra, NTPC, TCS, ONGC and HCL Tech led the losses.

All sectoral indices ended the day on a positive note with banking and realty sectors leading. The Nifty PSU Bank index gained the most, up nearly 5.6 percent followed by the Nifty Realty (up 4.4 percent), the Nifty Metal (up 3 percent) and the Nifty Auto (up 3 percent). The Nifty Bank and the Nifty Pvt Bank indices also rose over 2.5 percent each.

Banking indices rose led by Bank of Baroda, PNB, ICICI Bank, SBI and Federal Bank, up between 3-8 percent amid hopes that the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) will cut repo rates in its next monetary policy in June to boost liquidity.

Shares of Jet Airways fell over 5 percent intraday after media reports that Hinduja Group and Etihad Airways failed to strike a deal to buy a stake in the cash-strapped airlines.

Shares of oil marketing companies rose, with HPCL surging over 4 percent and IOC and BPCL up between 1.5-3 percent as oil markets stabilised amid OPEC supply cuts and tensions in the Middle East, after posting their steepest falls since the start of the year earlier in the week on the back of a global economic slowdown.

Globally, MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan bounced back to trade flat after hitting a four-month low earlier. The index is still on track for a third straight weekly loss, down 0.8 percent so far on the week.

Chinese equities firmed as some investors took advantage of cheap share prices. The Shanghai Composite gained 0.1 percent and the blue-chip CSI 300 rose 0.4 percent. Hong Kong’s Hang Seng added 0.3 percent, while, Japan’s Nikkei average was lower by 0.3 percent.