Nifty hits new 2012 high, Sensex up 300 pts; Rupee spikes

The 50-share NSE Nifty has touched a new 2012 high of 5,657.75 Friday due to heavy inflow of foreign money after the government remained firm on their decision of FDI approvals taken last week. Media reports said the government would continue to come up with new reforms next week.

The BSE benchmark shot up 309 points or 1.7% to 18,657.87, supported by all bluechips. Meanwhile, the NSE benchmark rallied 100 points to 5,654.65.

The sharp recovery in Indian rupee indicated that the foreign institutional investors may have bought more into equities today. The rupee rose by 54 paise today to trade at 53.85 against the US dollar. FIIs had been bought more than Rs 73,000 crore worth of shares till yesterday since the beginning of 2012.

India's largest private sector lender ICICI Bank jumped 3.5% while its rival State Bank of India was up 2.4%.

Engineering conglomerate Larsen & Toubro and state-run power equipment manufacturer BHEL rallied 3-4%.

Cigarette major ITC, housing finance company HDFC and index heavyweight Reliance Industries were up 1-2%.

Healthcare majors Sun Pharma, Dr Reddy's Labs and Cipla gained 1.5-2%. Metals stocks like Hindalco, Sterlite Industries and Tata Steel went up 2-3.5%.

Telecom operator Bharti Airtel and private power producer Tata Power moved up 2.5-3%.

On the global front, Asian markets remained firm. Shanghai was up 0.8% and Hang Seng rose 1%. Nikkei, Kospi and Straits Times went up 0.5% each.

Advancing shares outnumbered declining by 1072 to 334 on the National Stock Exchange.