Investing.com – India equities were higher at the close on Thursday, as gains in the Oil & Gas, Metals and IT sectors propelled shares higher.
At the close in NSE, the Nifty 50 gained 0.42%, while the BSE Sensex 30 index gained 0.41%.
The biggest gainers of the session on the Nifty 50 were Hindalco Industries Ltd. (NS:HALC), which rose 3.35% or 8.15 points to trade at 251.50 at the close. Bharat Petroleum Corp. Ltd. (NS:BPCL) added 3.38% or 15.55 points to end at 475.05 and ICICI Bank Ltd (NS:ICBK) was up 3.07% or 9.80 points to 328.65 in late trade.
Biggest losers included Indiabulls Housing Finance Ltd (NS:INBF), which lost 2.70% or 36.45 points to trade at 1312.30 in late trade. Hero MotoCorp Ltd (NS:HROM) declined 1.97% or 70.95 points to end at 3527.25 and Cipla Ltd. (NS:CIPL) shed 1.64% or 10.10 points to 605.85.
The top performers on the BSE Sensex 30 were ICICI Bank Ltd (BO:ICBK) which rose 3.15% to 328.60, Infosys Ltd (BO:INFY) which was up 1.47% to settle at 1114.15 and Power Grid Corporation of India Ltd (BO:PGRD) which gained 1.46% to close at 198.30.
The worst performers were Hero MotoCorp Ltd (BO:HROM) which was down 1.85% to 3533.15 in late trade, Tata Steel Ltd (BO:TISC) which lost 1.20% to settle at 699.85 and Bharti Airtel Ltd (BO:BRTI) which was down 1.15% to 429.20 at the close.
Declining stocks outnumbered rising ones by 1211 to 392 and 19 ended unchanged; on the Bombay Stock Exchange, 1892 fell and 870 advanced, while 119 ended unchanged on the India National Stock Exchange.
The India VIX, which measures the implied volatility of Nifty 50 options, was down 5.06% to 16.3150.
In commodities trading, Gold Futures for April delivery was down 0.13% or 1.70 to $1356.30 a troy ounce. Meanwhile, Crude oil for delivery in March rose 0.51% or 0.31 to hit $60.91 a barrel, while the April Brent oil contract rose 0.05% or 0.03 to trade at $64.39 a barrel.
USD/INR was down 0.14% to 63.935, while EUR/INR rose 0.00% to 79.8119.
The US Dollar Index Futures was down 0.27% at 88.67.