Investing.com – India equities were higher at the close on Friday, as gains in the Banking, Consumer Durables and Healthcare sectors propelled shares higher.
At the close in NSE, the Nifty 50 added 0.30%, while the BSE Sensex 30 index gained 0.23%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the Nifty 50 were Grasim Industries Ltd (NS:GRAS), which rose 5.92% or 121.75 points to trade at 2,179.05 at the close. State Bank Of India (NS:SBI) added 3.67% or 25.70 points to end at 725.25 and Apollo Hospitals Enterprises Ltd. (NS:APLH) was up 3.25% or 202.75 points to 6,433.75 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd. (NS:MAHM), which lost 2.34% or 39.50 points to trade at 1,646.40 in late trade. Bharti Airtel Ltd. (NS:BRTI) declined 1.92% or 21.90 points to end at 1,120.25 and Oil And Natural Gas Corporation Ltd (NS:ONGC) shed 1.85% or 5.05 points to 268.10.
The top performers on the BSE Sensex 30 were State Bank Of India (BO:SBI) which rose 3.55% to 724.25, Sun Pharmaceutical Industries Ltd. (BO:SUN) which was up 2.31% to settle at 1,534.85 and ICICI Bank Ltd (BO:ICBK) which gained 2.14% to close at 1,010.75.
The worst performers were Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd. (BO:MAHM) which was down 2.40% to 1,646.85 in late trade, Bharti Airtel Ltd (BO:BRTI) which lost 1.94% to settle at 1,120.45 and NTPC Ltd (BO:NTPC) which was down 1.84% to 324.90 at the close.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 1539 to 609 and 32 ended unchanged; on the Bombay Stock Exchange, 2451 fell and 1237 advanced, while 92 ended unchanged on the India National Stock Exchange.
The India VIX, which measures the implied volatility of Nifty 50 options, was down 2.40% to 15.45.
In commodities trading, Gold Futures for April delivery was down 0.03% or 0.55 to $2,047.35 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in March rose 0.14% or 0.11 to hit $76.33 a barrel, while the April Brent oil contract fell 0.05% or 0.04 to trade at $81.59 a barrel.
USD/INR was up 0.07% to 83.04, while EUR/INR fell 0.04% to 89.39.
The US Dollar Index Futures was up 0.05% at 104.09.