Indian Shares Rally On Fed Rate Cut Hopes

(RTTNews) - Indian shares rallied on Wednesday, with buying seen across the board as a slew of weak economic data from the United States helped reinforce bets that the Federal Reserve will cut interest rates in December.

Lower interest rates in the U.S. generally improve liquidity conditions and increase the attractiveness of emerging markets such as India.

Falling crude oil prices in international markets on signs of progress in U.S.-brokered peace talks between Russia and Ukraine as well as exchange data showing FII buying also boosted investor sentiment.

The benchmark BSE Sensex jumped 1,022.50 points, or 1.21 percent, to 85,609.51 amid broad-based buying. The broader NSE Nifty index surged 320.50 points, or 1.24 percent, to 26,205.30.

The mood was also upbeat across mid and small-cap stocks, with the BSE mid-cap and small-cap indexes climbing 1.3 percent and 1.2 percent, respectively.

The market breadth was positive on the BSE, with 2,809 shares rising while 1,363 shares declined and 153 shares closed unchanged.

Among the top gainers, Bajaj-twins Bajaj Finance and Bajaj FinServ rallied around 2.5 percent each.

Larsen & Toubro, UltraTech, Tech Mahindra, Infosys, Axis Bank, TMPV, Sun Pharma, Reliance Industries and Tata Steel all rose around 2 percent.

Bharti Airtel fell 1.6 percent following a large block deal where a promoter entity sold shares.

Globally, Asian and European markets advanced, and gold hit a two-week high while the dollar and U.S. Treasury yields eased on rate cut expectations.

Oil was little changed in European trade after closing at the lowest in a month on Tuesday on oversupply concerns.