Taking Stock: Nifty above 19,800, Sensex gains 261 pts; power, FMCG rally

Top gainers on the Nifty were BPCL, Power Grid Corporation, SBI Life Insurance, HDFC Life and Coal India, while losers included Tata Motors, L&T, UPL, IndusInd Bank and TCS.

All the sectoral indices ended in the green with the power index up 1 percent, while FMCG, PSU Bank, metal and oil & gas added 0.5 percent each.

BSE Midcap index added 0.4 percent and Smallcap index gained 0.7 percent for the day.

A long build-up was seen in Can Fin Himes, L&T Finance Holdings and Birlasoft, while a short build-up was seen in Dalmia Bharat, Mphasis and Havells India.

Among individual stocks, a volume spike of more than 400 percent was seen in L&T Finance Holdings, Can Fin Homes and MRF.

MRF, Jammu & Kashmir Bank, Lupin, Tata Consumer Products, Sun TV Network, Polycab India, Gail India, Balkrishna Industries, Welspun Corp, among others, touched their 52-week high on the BSE. Click here for the full list

Outlook for October 18

Jatin Gedia – Technical Research Analyst at Sharekhan by BNP Paribas:

On the daily charts the Nifty broke the Inside bar pattern on the upside which has bullish implications. The daily and hourly momentum indicator has a positive crossover which indicates that the dips should be bought into. On the upside the index is likely to continue its rally towards 19883 and beyond that potentially towards 20030. On the downside the key hourly moving averages placed in the range 19770 – 19750 are likely to act as a cushion in case of a dip.

Bank Nifty opened gap up however was unable to capitalize on the gains and it corrected intraday. However, the dip is likely to witness buying interest in the zone of 44350 – 44300 where support in the form of the key hourly moving averages are placed. We expect the pullback in Bank Nifty towards 45,000 from short term perspective. On the downside 44100 – 44000 shall act as a crucial support

Rupak De, Senior Technical analyst at LKP Securities:

The market started to gap up following strong global sentiment and has so far remained in strength. The short-term trend remains strong as the index sustains above critical moving averages on the daily timeframe. A "buy on dips" strategy is favored as long as it remains above 19,550. On the higher end, it might move towards 20,000-20,200.

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