Market Close: Indian benchmark indices ended at day’s high levels in the highly volatile session on March supported by the auto, bank, oil & gas and metal stocks.

At close, the Sensex was up 231.29 points or 0.40% at 57,593.49, and the Nifty was up 69 points or 0.40% at 17222. About 1051 shares have advanced, 2268 shares declined, and 123 shares are unchanged.

Bharti Airtel, Coal India, Axis Bank, Eicher Motors and ICICI Bank were among the top Nifty gainers.

On the other hand, UPL, SBI Life Insurance, Nestle India, Dr Reddy’s Laboratories, HDFC were among the big losers.

Among sectors, bank and oil & gas indices gained a percent each, and auto and metal indices added 0.5 percent each. However, selling was seen in the capital goods, IT and pharma names.

The broader indices underperformed the benchmarks. BSE midcap and smallcap indices ended in the red.

Aster DM Healthcare share price rose 10 percent after the company signed a memorandum of understanding (MoU) with Tamil Nadu to set up healthcare facilities.

Share prices of multiplex players PVR and Inox Leisure touched their 52-week highs, a day after the announcement of their merger deal to create a cinema giant with more than 1,500 screens.

Share price of Bharti Airtel rose 3 percent as the company is going to acquire 4.7 percent equity in Indus Towers from an affiliate of Vodafone Group Plc at Rs 187.88 per share with the transaction totalling Rs 2,388.06 crore.

GAIL India share price gained 3 percent as the meeting of the board of directors of the company is scheduled on March 31 to consider and approve buy back of the fully paid-up equity shares of the company.

News Source:- Moneycontrol