Dalal Street lights up before Diwali; Sensex, Nifty touch fresh record highs

Mumbai: The BSE Sensex rose by 200.95 points to close at an all-time high of 32,633.64 as investor optimism climbed following encouraging comments from the IMF chief.

The broader NSE Nifty too ended at a fresh life-time high of 10,230.85 points, showing gains of 63.40 points, or 0.62 per cent, in its record setting spree for the second session.

Market sentiment was buoyant in a truncated trading week ahead of Diwali and encouraging Q2 earnings from oil-to- telecom conglomerate Reliance Industries.

The rupee appreciating further to 64.68 against the dollar (intra-day) at the forex market too fuelled the rally.

Sentiments got a lift after the IMF chief Christine Lagarde on Saturday said the Indian economy is on a "very solid track" in the mid-term, triggering all-round buying activity, brokers said.

The broader NSE Nifty zoomed past the 10,200-mark for the first time to hit an all-time high of 10,242.95. It however failed to maintain record levels on profit-booking, and settled at new high of 10,230.85, up 63.40 points, or 0.62 per cent.

It broke its previous record closing of 10,167.45, hit on October 13.

The BSE Sensex after scaling an all-time high of 32,687.32 points at the outset, finally ended 200.95 points to end at a new peak of 32,633.64, breaching its previous record of 32,575.17 hit on August 1 and also broke its intra-day record of 32,686.48 reached on August 2.

The gauge had gained 598.70 points in the previous two straight sessions.

Unabated buying by domestic institutional investors (DIIs) and wholesale price inflation (WPI) falling to 2.60 per cent in September, helped both the key indices to scale new highs.